Art of Despair: An Introspection of Madness Through 19th Century Post-Impressionism

By the late 19th century, the Impressionists had already been experimenting with evolving artistic techniques to convey the natural beauty of the world, but it was the visceral response of Post-Impressionists like Vincent Van Gogh and Edvard Munch that transcended the new movement by internalizing the world around them to use it as a window into the souls of the artists themselves. It was the later works of Munch and Van Gogh, however, that would encompass the feelings that much of Europe had been holding onto during this time. The art created by these two artists would express these bubbling emotions and bring to light the hardships felt by the people during such an unstable and uncertain time. Within the grips of madness and despair, both VanGogh and Munch recorded their pain and mental instability through their art, and it was the art that would foreshadow their trauma and tragedy to come.