Editing Vincent van Gogh (section)

====Hospital in Arles (December 1888)====
{{See also|Hospital in Arles}}
[[File:Le Forum Républicain (Arles) - 30 December 1888 - Vincent van Gogh ear incident.jpg|thumb|Local newspaper report dated 30 December 1888 recording Van Gogh's self-mutilation{{sfnp|Hulsker|1980|loc= 380–382}}|alt=photograph of a partial 19th-century newspaper story about a self-mutilation]]
[[File:Felix Rey portrait & sketch.jpg|thumb|''[[Portrait of Doctor Rey]]'', January 1889, [[Pushkin Museum]]; note written by Dr Rey for novelist [[Irving Stone]] with sketches of the damage to Van Gogh's ear]]

The exact sequence that led to the mutilation of Van Gogh's ear is not known. Gauguin said, fifteen years later, that the night followed several instances of physically threatening behaviour.{{sfnp|McQuillan|1989|loc=66}} Their relationship was complex and Theo may have owed money to Gauguin, who suspected the brothers were exploiting him financially.{{sfnp|Druick|Zegers|2001|loc= 266}} It seems likely that Vincent realised that Gauguin was planning to leave.{{sfnp|Druick|Zegers|2001|loc= 266}} The following days saw heavy rain, leading to the two men being shut in the Yellow House.{{sfnp|Sweetman|1990|loc= 290}} Gauguin recalled that Van Gogh followed him after he left for a walk and "rushed towards me, an open razor in his hand".{{sfnp|Sweetman|1990|loc= 290}} This account is uncorroborated;{{sfnp|Sweetman|1990|loc= 1}} Gauguin was almost certainly absent from the Yellow House that night, most likely staying in a hotel.{{sfnp|Sweetman|1990|loc= 290}}

After an altercation on the evening of 23 December 1888,<ref name="berkeley" /> Van Gogh returned to his room where he seemingly heard [[auditory hallucination|voices]] and either wholly or in part severed his left ear with a razor{{efn|group=note|Theo and his wife, Gachet and his son, and Signac, who saw van Gogh after the bandages were removed, maintained that only the [[earlobe]] had been removed.{{sfnp| Rewald|1978|loc= 243–248}} According to Doiteau and Leroy, the diagonal cut removed the lobe and probably a little more.{{sfnp|Doiteau|Leroy|1928}} The policeman and Rey both claimed van Gogh severed the entire [[auricle (anatomy)|outer ear]];{{sfnp| Rewald|1978|loc= 243–248}} Rey repeated his account in 1930, writing a note for novelist [[Irving Stone]] and including a sketch of the line of the incision.<ref name="artnews">{{cite web|url=https://www.artsy.net/article/artsy-editorial-how-one-art-history-teacher-solved-two-of-the-biggest-mysteries-about-van-gogh|title=How One Art History Teacher Solved Two of the Biggest Mysteries about Van Gogh|last=Cain|first=Abigail|date=26 July 2016|website=artsy.net|access-date=21 February 2019|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20190221224047/https://www.artsy.net/article/artsy-editorial-how-one-art-history-teacher-solved-two-of-the-biggest-mysteries-about-van-gogh|archive-date=21 February 2019|url-status=live}}</ref>}} causing severe bleeding.{{sfnp| Rewald|1978|loc= 243–248}} He bandaged the wound, wrapped the ear in paper and delivered the package to a woman at a brothel Van Gogh and Gauguin both frequented.{{sfnp| Rewald|1978|loc= 243–248}} Van Gogh was found unconscious the next morning by a policeman and taken to the hospital,{{sfnp|Sund|2002|loc= 235}}{{sfnp|Gayford|2006|loc=277}} where he was treated by Félix Rey, a young doctor still in training. The ear was brought to the hospital, but Rey did not attempt to reattach it as too much time had passed.{{sfnp|Sweetman|1990|loc= 290}} Van Gogh researcher and art historian Bernadette Murphy discovered the true identity of the woman named Gabrielle Berlatier,<ref>{{cite book |last1=Bailey |first1=Martin |title=Living with Vincent van Gogh: The Homes & Landscapes That Shaped the Artist |date=2020 |publisher=Quarto Publishing Group |isbn=9780711240193 |page=139 |url=https://books.google.com/books?id=Zx2XDwAAQBAJ&pg=PA139 |access-date=30 May 2024}}</ref> who died in Arles at the age of 80 in 1952. Her descendants still lived (as of 2020) just outside Arles. Gabrielle, known in her youth as "Gaby", was a 17-year-old cleaning girl at the brothel and other local establishments at the time Van Gogh presented her with his ear.<ref name="berkeley">{{Cite web|url=https://news.lib.berkeley.edu/van-Gogh-ear|title=What actually happened to Vincent van Gogh's ear? Here are 3 things you should know.|website=UC Berkeley Library News|access-date=6 September 2020|archive-date=26 October 2020|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20201026061425/https://news.lib.berkeley.edu/van-Gogh-ear|url-status=live}}</ref><ref>{{Cite web|url=https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=AgMBRQLhgFE|title=BBC The Mystery of Van Goghs Ear|date=2 January 2017 |via=www.youtube.com|access-date=6 September 2020|archive-date=6 September 2020|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20200906063851/https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=AgMBRQLhgFE|url-status=live}}</ref><ref>{{Cite news|url=https://www.theglobeandmail.com/arts/art-and-architecture/historian-bernadette-murphy-on-digging-into-the-van-gogh-ear-mystery/article30915559/|title=Historian Bernadette Murphy on digging into the Van Gogh ear mystery|newspaper=The Globe and Mail|date=14 July 2016|access-date=6 September 2020|archive-date=30 October 2020|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20201030165223/https://www.theglobeandmail.com/arts/art-and-architecture/historian-bernadette-murphy-on-digging-into-the-van-gogh-ear-mystery/article30915559/|url-status=live|last1=Adams|first1=James}}</ref>

Van Gogh had no recollection of the event, suggesting that he may have suffered an acute mental breakdown.{{sfnp|Naifeh|Smith|2011|loc=707–708}} The hospital diagnosis was "acute mania with generalised delirium",{{sfnp|Naifeh|Smith|2011|loc= 249}} and within a few days, the local police ordered that he be placed in hospital care.{{sfnp|Van Gogh|2009|loc=[http://vangoghletters.org/vg/documentation.html Concordance, lists, bibliography: Documentation]}}{{sfnp|Sund|2002|loc= 237}} Gauguin immediately notified Theo, who, on 24 December, had proposed marriage to his old friend [[Andries Bonger]]'s sister Johanna.{{sfnp| Rewald|1986|loc= 37}} That evening, Theo rushed to the station to board a night train to Arles. He arrived on Christmas Day and comforted Vincent, who seemed to be semi-lucid. That evening, he left Arles for the return trip to Paris.{{sfnp|Naifeh|Smith|2011|loc= 704–705}}

During the first days of his treatment, Van Gogh repeatedly and unsuccessfully asked for Gauguin, who asked a policeman attending the case to "be kind enough, Monsieur, to awaken this man with great care, and if he asks for me tell him I have left for Paris; the sight of me might prove fatal for him."{{sfnp|Gayford|2006|loc=284}} Gauguin fled Arles, never to see Van Gogh again. They continued to correspond, and in 1890, Gauguin proposed they form a studio in Antwerp. Meanwhile, other visitors to the hospital included Marie Ginoux and Roulin.{{sfnp|Pickvance |1986|loc=62}}

Despite a pessimistic diagnosis, Van Gogh recovered and returned to the Yellow House on 7 January 1889.{{sfnp|Naifeh|Smith|2011|loc= 713}} He spent the following month between hospital and home, suffering from hallucinations and [[delusion]]s of poisoning.{{sfnp|Sweetman|1990|loc= 298–300}} In March, the police closed his house after a petition by 30 townspeople (including the Ginoux family) who described him as ''le fou roux'' "the redheaded madman";{{sfnp|Van Gogh|2009|loc=[http://vangoghletters.org/vg/documentation.html Concordance, lists, bibliography: Documentation]}} Van Gogh returned to the hospital. Paul Signac visited him twice in March;{{sfnp|Sweetman|1990|loc= 300}} in April, Van Gogh moved into rooms owned by Rey after floods damaged paintings in his own home.{{refn|{{harvp|Pickvance|1986|loc= 239–242}}; {{harvp|Tralbaut|1981|loc= 265–273.}}}} Two months later, he left Arles and voluntarily entered an asylum in [[Saint-Rémy-de-Provence]]. Around this time, he wrote, "Sometimes moods of indescribable anguish, sometimes moments when the veil of time and fatality of circumstances seemed to be torn apart for an instant."{{sfnp|Hughes|1990|loc= 145}}

Van Gogh gave his 1889 ''[[Portrait of Doctor Rey]]'' to Rey. The doctor was not fond of the painting and used it to repair a chicken coop, then gave it away.<ref name=":0">{{Cite news|url=http://www.irishtimes.com/news/world/europe/gun-used-by-vincent-van-gogh-to-kill-himself-goes-on-display-1.2719415|title=Gun used by Vincent van Gogh to kill himself goes on display|last=Cluskey|first=Peter|date=12 July 2016|newspaper=The Irish Times|access-date=22 October 2016|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20161023053859/http://www.irishtimes.com/news/world/europe/gun-used-by-vincent-van-gogh-to-kill-himself-goes-on-display-1.2719415|archive-date=23 October 2016|url-status=live}}</ref> In 2016, the portrait was housed at the [[Pushkin Museum of Fine Arts]] and estimated to be worth over $50&nbsp;million.<ref>{{Cite web|url=http://www.vangoghstudio.com/portrait-of-doctor-felix-rey/|title=Portrait of Doctor Felix Rey Oil Painting Reproduction, 1889|website=van gogh studio|language=nl-NL|access-date=22 October 2016|url-status=dead|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20161023061312/http://www.vangoghstudio.com/portrait-of-doctor-felix-rey/|archive-date=23 October 2016}}</ref>

<gallery widths="165px" heights="165px" class="center">
File:Van Gogh - Selbstbildnis mit verbundenem Ohr und Pfeife.jpeg|alt=A portrait of Vincent van Gogh from the right; he is smoking a pipe, wearing a winter hat. His ear is bandaged and he has no beard.|''Self-portrait with Bandaged Ear and Pipe'', 1889, private collection
File:Van Gogh - Garten des Hospitals in Arles1.jpeg|alt=A courtyard garden of a large building with tree and fountain.|''The Courtyard of the Hospital at Arles'', 1889, Oskar Reinhart Collection "[[Am Römerholz]]", [[Winterthur]], Switzerland
File:Vincent van Gogh - Self-portrait with bandaged ear (1889, Courtauld Institute).jpg|alt=A portrait of Vincent van Gogh from the right; he is wearing a winter hat, his ear is bandaged and he has no beard.|''Self-portrait with Bandaged Ear'', 1889, [[Courtauld Institute of Art]], London
File:Ward in the Hospital in Arles.jpg|alt=A large room of a large building with hospital beds and several people gathered around a wood-burning stove; nuns and others are in the background.|''Ward in the Hospital in Arles'', 1889, Oskar Reinhart Collection "Am Römerholz", Winterthur, Switzerland
</gallery>
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