It seems when one closes their bedroom door all mundane thoughts are gone and you are left with your imagination. One who agrees with this interpretation is Jane Flanders. Jane Flanders is a highly educated woman, as she attended Mar College and Columbia University, she has three books of poems published and has won many awards. A person whose mind is always running and always working such as hers can agree that rest for the imagination is the best way to strengthen it.
One simple painting of his bed and petite, creaky room and one simple four stanza poem shows how materialistic possessions can never reflect the human soul, simplicity in life heightens creativity ND how solitude doesn’t have to be a negative aspect in life. “l can tell you that for my part I will try to keep a straight course, and will paint the most simple, the most common things” (Van Gogh, 545). This was written in a letter to Vincent brother Thee, Van Gogh is declaring how he now wants to live his life: straight forward and simple.
As one can see in the painting he did not accumulate many riches in his life. He never kept heirlooms or anything of wealthy status. His bedroom as described in the poem is “is narrow… Clumsy but friendly… Empty’ (Flanders, Van Sago’s Bed). The pictures on the wall are crooked, it’s a tiny room for one with a narrow window, filled with a table where he works and chairs to sit on. Flanders describes it Just as it is, these adjectives can be not be clearer. To me this proves that materialistic objects in life can never reflect the soul off person.
Van Gogh had a talent that millions of apprentices striver for. It was typical for only the rich to be educated and/or learn an artist’s trade. It’s common for the wealthy to obtain more opportunities in life than he poor, yet a man with many personal struggles in his life is known as a man today that is hard to measure up to. Many people believe your status, or what you own is who you are, this is not true. One can see how his bedrooms looks like one of a peasants, yet this status or preconception does not diminish nor prove that he is not gifted or have a remarkable soul.
It’s like today how homeless people are looked down upon like uneducated, untalented scum but in reality they could be Just as gifted as a privileged person. Just because they struggle in different ways than we do goes not mean their soul is any less valuable. The value of what we own does not determine the value of our souls and being. What creates this value is our imagination, spirit, morals, personality, creativity and expression. These aspects in life help us find our purpose, our materialistic success can never fulfill such a destiny.
Without imagination what would life be like? The only word I can think of is lifeless. No child’s smile would light up the room, no painting would be filled with color, no Joke would ever hear a laugh, no purpose would there be in life. Just as cells re the building blocks of physical life, imaginations are the building blocks of our purposes in life, whatever they may be. When looking at his painting I take from the simplicity, rest. Rest of the mind, body and spirit, when these three are at rest they grow a unique, metal potential kinetic energy.
When one locks themselves away from the world in their bedroom, a safe place where no one can disturb them, their mind is now at ease. There are no worries that can bother them, whatever is out of sight is now out of mind and the mind now becomes clearer. When the mind is clear and jack to its simplistic ways all that is left is imagination and creativity that is free to roam. This is why Van Sago’s bed is right next to his work desk where his mind can freely express itself. It’s common for all humans to lay in bed and because the complexities of our day is over we no longer have to think about what is next until the morning.
Nothing left is on our lists for us to be preoccupied with. Life complexity cripples creativity, if we’re constantly thinking about our mundane world, we never have a chance to think about our inner selves. This can also be proven in the color Van Gogh uses. The brilliant, vibrant colors such as orange, yellow, blue and green come to life via simple form. His use of these colors bring his bedroom to life, it proves that even though it’s a simple picture, its one little thing in life that makes the difference of it Just existing or it living, that’s creativity that sparks from imagination.
All in all, rest lets our minds breathe and gives us a greater creative potential, and anything else more than simple can deprive us from this. Looking at his painting, one might feel sadness by observing how there are two pillows for one head and two hairs for one body. Being alone is mostly deemed as a negative aspect in life, and it is natural to think that due to humans instinctual being social creatures. Though it is lovely having loved ones in life, solitude is not always negative, you can be alone without feeling lonely.
Flanders describes his bedroom as, “is empty, morning light pours in like wine, melody, fragrance, the memory of happiness” (Flanders, 545). She perfectly shows how emptiness isn’t always a hollow pain, but rather a nostalgic memory. Memories were created in that bedroom, paintings with inexplicable expressions of the Joy in life and the sad confusion. Van Gogh wasn’t alone, he had himself, he had his artwork, and his imagination alone kept him company. Solitude is one of the many paths to figure out our niche in life, something that he longed for.
Learning to be happy alone brings a life time of happiness, you never have to depend on someone or something else to bring you happiness in life. You are always with yourself and loving and enjoying your own company is a stable way to ensure your happiness. Even though Van Gogh is seen historically as an unstable man, solitude ay have given him stability. He didn’t seem to “fit into” the world around him, but the world he understood was his own through art.
One can also see in this stanza how Flanders compares the morning light pouring in like wine, a melody or a fragrance, all very simple things that can spark a memory. These may have been things one experienced by themselves resting, reflecting upon them alone, how a memory of an experience learning about themselves can bring self-happiness. This is why solitude is not always a such a bad thing, we are our greatest teachers in life, only we can fulfill our destinies and we can only move to the next step by knowing who we are and we do this through solitude.
A painting so simple yet packed with so much. Van Gogh succeeded in showing the viewer what he wanted to portray, how our materialistic life can never reflect the life we live on the inside of ourselves, how when we rest our minds they finally begin to work the way they were destined to and how solitude enables us to progress in our personal purposes in life. Van Gogh states, “It’s Just simply my bedroom, only here color is to do everything, and giving by TTS simplification a grander style to things, is to be suggestive here of rest or of sleep in general.
In a word, to look at the picture ought to rest the brain or rather the imagination” (545). Van Gogh shows all he intends to through color, life could not exist in black in white, and nothing would be unique. He uses these bright colors in his unique signature pattern to portray how different ones imagination can change something so simple. It’s still simple, Just more valuable, it’s customized. This shows how materials can never prove who we are, imagination sparks from rest and prospers from ourselves.
