The Best Things in Life are Yellow

My friends and I sometimes discuss how great artists often have "tortured souls" - how a lot of musicians, poets, and visual artists go through periods of severe depression, experience tragic losses, live as outcasts, get afflicted with all sorts of physical and mental illnesses, and eventually take their own lives; and how they draw from and translate these life experiences to create gripping, memorable, and timeless works of art.

I think the reason why music, literature, and visuals created by artists with "tortured souls" end up becoming famous (a lot of times after the artist's death) is that people like to use these works of art as a form of escape from their otherwise mundane and meaningless existence.  Most people follow a formula or a template in living their lives - finish school, find a job, buy a car and a house, build a family, do good, and die happy.  However, even though the social pressures to conform with these life formulas and templates are strong, there is always that primal craving to experience life in its rawest form, the desire to live life to the extreme.  Thus, these artists with "tortured souls" become the sacrificial lambs who go through these turbulent life experiences, create art from them, and eventually become icons of the inseparability of the artist's self, life,and art.  And it's as if this whole package of the tortured artist's self, life, and art is sealed in a can or ground up to make tablets to be sold to and be consumed by people to supplement their dreary and worthless lives.

Perhaps one of the more illustrative examples of an artist with a "tortured soul" is Vincent van Gogh.  It's been speculated that he suffered from various illnesses including epilepsy and bipolar disorder.  His life was filled with turmoil and despair (one familiar anecdote is of him cutting off his left ear during a time of great loneliness) and it is generally believed that he died by committing suicide at the age of 37.  Although he was considerably prolific during his most productive years, he was only able to sell one painting while he was alive.  Of course, things have changed a lot since his death and he is now one of the most recognizable painters of all time and his paintings rank among the most expensive paintings ever sold.

One of the most highlighted elements in Vincent van Gogh's life and art is his obsession with the color yellow.  His house, its furnishings, and decorations were colored yellow and he also wrote about the beauty of the color yellow in his letters.  Moreover, most of his paintings during his last years showed the extensive use of the color yellow and the overall yellow tint.

It is hypothesized that this obsession with the color yellow was due to xanthopsia or yellow vision caused by poisoning from digitalis (used as treatment for his epilepsy) and his excessive intake of absinthe liquor.

And so I decided to make this post an homage to Vincent van Gogh, by sharing photos from a recent dinner out with friends, edited to highlight the color yellow.  My resources and skills in photo editing are limited so I'm not sure if I was able to achieve what I wanted the photos to become.

Nonetheless, I think everything in this post (the discussion on artists with "tortured souls," the feature on Vincent van Gogh, and the photos from the dinner out) goes well together since during the dinner, my friends and I found ourselves reflecting on our lives, its meaning, and what to do with it next.

The night ended with us still clueless.

He who despairs of the human condition is a coward, but he who has hope for it is a fool. - Albert Camus