Hannah SinghurseMrs. KidwellEnglish 9A26 March 2014Vincent Van GoghVincent Van Gogh is one of the greatest and best-known artists in the world, but when he was alive he considered himself a complete failure. It was only after his death that Van Gogh's paintings received the recognition they deserved. Today he is considered the second best Dutch artist, after Rembrandt. Born in 1853, he was one of the major artistic influences of the 19th century. Vincent Van Gogh created a new era of art, learned to use art to escape his mental illness, and still continues to inspire artists more than 100 years later. During Vincent Van Gogh's childhood, and even before he was born, impressionism was the most common art form. Impressionism was a very limiting type of art, with certain colors and scenes you had to paint with. Some artists, however, had grown tired of impressionism and wanted to create their own genre of art. These artists, including Paul Gaugin, Vincent Van Gogh, Henri de Toulouse-Lautrec and Paul Cezanne, hoped to express themselves better by painting ...