Nowadays with the help of social media we can openly share the good times, the joyous times, things that make us laugh in our lives but what about the times that are not so great? We all had a time in our lives where we felt lost and confused. Sometimes we would even tell ourselves that we are complete failures. If we try to express our sadness, we are then told to brush off it off and try again. So we learn to hide the pain with a sad smile. As a former competitive figure skater we were told to do just that. “Fake it to you make it” but what happens when you don’t make it? This issue is dedicated to those that “failed” in their lives while trying to keep everything to themselves looking pretty on the outside; all the while they were breaking slowing on the inside. To those that reach for stars to only get burned when trying and to those that wished for a better life only to fall into a cycle of despair and hopelessness. It’s time to stop teaching that failures is something we can just gloss over and it is something we can easily move on from. This fanzine is small reminder to ourselves that it’s ok to NOT be okay. Here’s to looking pretty in failure and waiting for our revival moment to break through the darkness.
“Lost myself trying to please everyone, now I’m losing everyone else trying to find myself ”
Vincent van Gogh (18531890) was a post-Impressionist painter whose work is notable for its beauty, emotional and colorful imagery. He is regarded as one of the most highly influential 19th-century artists. He is tragically and equally well-known throughout the world for not only his artworks but for his struggles with his mental health and his tragic and turbulent life story. Van Gogh turned to art due to his failure as a student, art dealer, minster-in-training and as a hopeless romantic looking for love in the wrong places. To find solace in his failures Van Gogh turned to art at the age of 26. But during his short life as an artist, Van Gogh struggled as a artist and heavily relied on his brother for most of his life. To make ends meet,he lived off of coffee, bread and absinthe. He is known to have ingested turpentine,and his painting materials. Experts later believed the consumption of ingesting poisonous paint may have contributed
to his declining physical and mental health. In December of 1888, he famously cut off his ear and offered it to a prostitute named Rachel. With blood pouring from his hand and head he asked her to“Keep this object carefully.” After this incident, he was admitted to the Hôtel-Dieu hospital and later to the Saint-Paul-deMausole asylum in Saint-Rémyde-Provence. He was forced to move due to the people living in Arles, France when they petitioned to have him removed stating that he was dangerous. Two years after cutting his ear off and drifting in and out of hospitals and asylums,on July 27, 1890, Vincent van Gogh went out to paint in the morning carrying a loaded pistol and shot himself in the chest, but the bullet did not kill him. His brother, Theo, later arrived after hearing the news of his brother’s incident found his brother sitting up in bed and smoking a pipe. Experts believed that his actions were due to his
uncertainty about his future because his brother, Theo, had visited recently and spoke to him about needing to be stricter with his finances. Van Gogh misunderstood and took that to mean Theo was no longer interested in selling his art. A few days later after shooting himself he subcummed to his wounds and on July 29, 1890, he died in the arms of his dearest brother who would follow him a few months later to the grave in a Dutch Asylum. Van Gogh produced more than 2,100 works, consisting of 860 oil paintings and more than 1,300 watercolors, drawings and sketches during his 10 years as an artist.Several of his paintings are now rank as one of the most expensive artworks in the world to buy; One of his masterpieces known as “Irises” sold for $53.9 million, and his “Portrait of Dr. Gachet” sold for $82.5 million but the only painting he ever sold in his lifetime was to his younger brother, Theo Van Gogh.
Throughout Vincent’s life his only supporter was his brother, who played an important role in his life an was his art dealer. During his lifetime he remained poor and virtually unknown until his untimely death at the age of 37 in 1890. It was not until after he died that his art works became famous due to the tireless effort by his Sister-in-law, Johanna, the wife of his brother Theo, who collected many of Van Gogh’s paintings she could, but later discovered that many had been destroyed or lost due to Van Gogh’s own mother having thrown away and destroyed his artworks, deeming them worthless. Thanks to Johanna’s tireless efforts, Van Gogh’s art works are now displayed in museums around the world in cities like Washington, D.C., Paris, New York and Amsterdam. He died beileving he was a failure. He will never know