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Why Did Van Gogh Struggle to Sell His Art While He Was Alive?
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May 22, 2025
Vincent van Gogh is a global icon today, yet during his lifetime, he was barely recognized. Despite creating over 2,000 artworks in just ten years, he sold only one confirmed painting while he was alive — and that’s a documented fact. Why did the art world overlook someone we now consider a genius? Listen now to explore the real reasons behind Van Gogh’s quiet career, and read more here: 👉 https://anitalouiseart.com/why-did-van-gogh-only-sell-one-painting-in-his-lifetime/ #VanGogh #VincentVanGogh #ArtHistory #FamousArtists #PaintingFacts #AnitaLouiseArt #VanGoghFacts #ArtPodcast Anita Louise Art is a blog and a YouTube channel about all things to do with art. Check out our blogs at https://anitalouiseart.com/ We would also love to hear from you!
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[Music]
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hi this is Anita from Five Minutes with
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Art you know one of the stories that's
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often told about the painter Vincent Van
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Gogh is that he only sold one paint in
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his lifetime vincent Van Gogh did die
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broke and he died without really seeing
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how popular he is today he really only
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sold one painting though there has been
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a record shown of another one of his
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paintings going to London and I don't
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know if that was before or after he
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passed away but the art world you know
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generally believes that he just sold one
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painting he gave us star night he gave
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us sunflowers he gave us a bedroom died
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thinking he was a failure you know think
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about that for a moment here's one of
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the greatest artists that's ever lived
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and if you if I mentioned several times
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if you do search on Google if you did a
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search on Google trends of you know
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popular artists Vincent Van Go usually
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always comes up in the top you know one
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or two or three artists you know so but
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he really only sold one painting the red
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vineyard and even then he sold it to a
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friend so it wasn't even sold to
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somebody walked off the street and said
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"I love your artwork i want to buy it."
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It basically was sold to a friend
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another artist a Belgium artist on a
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book that she uh was the one who bought
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his painting she bought it for 400
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francs about a,000 to$2,000 US in
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today's money think about that for a
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moment so she bought it but it was you
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know not a very expensive painting and
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she more or less almost like she was
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doing him a favor i'm going to buy one
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of your paintings and this is now
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displayed in a museum in Moscow
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there's some debate that Vincent Mang go
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he did trade some of his paintings for
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other people's paintings there was some
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debate about that but really when it
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comes to like earning money on it
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probably more more was just one painting
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that was actually sold why did he sell
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so little well there's a couple reasons
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why one he was very much ahead of his
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time you know in in the art world if he
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had lived longer maybe he would have
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seen success later in his life
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he was constantly moving he was moving
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to different places he was you know
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lived in Netherlands Belgium Paris Aries
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you know he he was moving all over
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France and so you know he was constantly
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moving he didn't really have a you know
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stable place so much he was you know in
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an asylum half the time painting so you
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know he wasn't really out there he had
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no real commercial representation even
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though his brother Theo did represent
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him um he didn't have dealers actively
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seeking his work his brother Theo an art
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dealer in Paris tried to promote him but
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it was tough it was you know very hard
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for Theo to promote him but Theo
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believed in him and kept helping him
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with finances but he harder for him to
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sell his work and to promote it vince Go
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was very socially isolated he had mental
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illness he didn't have many stable
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relationships he you know he alienated
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people he was probably one of these sort
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of odd ducks that people thought who is
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this guy in the neighborhood you know we
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don't want to be around him and then on
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top of that he cut off his ear and
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handed his ear to a a prostitute in a
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brothel and they had to call the police
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on him so you know people were probably
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saying "Who's this weirdo that cut off
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his own ear?" He had a very short-lived
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career he started painting seriously at
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27 and he died by 37 so he only really
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was painting seriously for 10 years
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vincent McGo felt like he was being
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overlooked he felt like people didn't
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appreciate his art but he kept painting
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anyway and that's one reason what I
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really love about Vincent Van Gogh is if
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any of you out there are artists you
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know maybe you feel that way people
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don't appreciate your art they don't
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understand you or maybe there's
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something else in your life that they
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don't understand or you feel like you're
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just not understood if you can remember
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the story of Vincent Van Gogh I think we
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can all learn from the story that here's
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a man that was very very misunderstood
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in his world that he you know they
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people just didn't understand him they
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didn't know who he was he was kind of
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the weirdo um you know down the street
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but yet he turned out to be one of the
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greatest artist who ever lived and today
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has a museum in Amsterdam dedicated to
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him but not only that is I think
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everyone knows his name i remember when
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I grew up this one of the sunflower
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paintings my mother had a copy of it
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that was you know hanging in our kitchen
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it was a you know very popular painting
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during that time and I think a lot of
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people loved his art they saw his art
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they felt something when they saw his
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art i love Vincent Van Go he's
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definitely one of my favorite painters
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if not my most favorite painter and the
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more I get to know him and his story the
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more I learned to appreciate him and
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just all he endured and all he went
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through in his life we hope that if
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you're interested in this we will put in
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our description a link to our blog post
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entitled "Why did Van Go only sell one
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painting in his lifetime?" And this
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might give you a couple ideas as to why
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he only sold one painting in his
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lifetime and maybe give you some food
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for thought for yourself and your own
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life and what does this mean for you
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because really art is not just about
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viewing the paintings it's about making
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art be part of who you are and it's
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maybe in seeing yourself and the world
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and those around you in a different way
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as you view art that is the power of art
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we've hope you've enjoyed this podcast
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thank you so much for listening that you
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will subscribe and join and be part of
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our community where we talk about art
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where we study about art where we learn
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about art because art like I said it can
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help you see the world in a different
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way thank you so much for listening
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[Music]
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