*an ongoing series of quotations – mostly from artists, to artists – that offers wisdom, inspiration, and advice for the sometimes lonely road we are on.

Vincent [van Gogh] found himself in perfect harmony with[Emile] Zola’s world view.  Neither of them sugarcoated or idealized the harsh reality of the everyday life that surrounded them, or the subjects it offered up.  The same reality was at the heart of both of their work.  In July 1883, Vincent read Zola’s essay on art, ‘Le Moment artistique,’ contained in one of his critical works on literary and artistic life, Mes haines (My Hatreds), in which Zola reflected on a crucial aspect of artistic creativity, going beyond the word ‘realistic;’ ‘the word “realist” means nothing to me, and I declare reality subordinate to temperament.’  Therefore, according to Zola, a ‘work of art is a corner of creation seen through a temperament.’ Vincent did not comment on this passage directly, but in his lines we see that in Zola’s words he found confirmation of his own beliefs.  To Theo, in 1885, he wrote of his attempts to capture the effects of light in The Potato Eaters:   “Not always literally exactly – rather never exactly – for one sees nature through one’s temperament.”  The two contrasting souls that live side by side in the author of Les Rougon Macquart, one methodical, the other creative, reflected Vincent’s own creative approach.                     

Mariella Guzzoni in Vincent’s Books:  Van Gogh and the Writers Who Inspired Him 

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