Vincent Van Gogh and

Mark Making

By Shannon Lewis

Born 13th March 1853Died 29th July 1890

Van Gogh created full drawings that were made up of distinctive quick marks of dots and dashes. The marks represent movement and texture which Van Gogh saw in the scenes he drew. Even the sky which people would usually think to be still has marks in it: maybe represents the weather such as the wind.

A Corner of a Garden in the Place Lamartine Reed pen and ink over graphite on wove paperAugust 1888

The Road to TarasconReed pen and ink over graphite on wove paperJuly-August 1888

The marks he used was also heavy and busy creating tone and atmosphere. Particularly in the ‘Sketch in Letter 542’ where it feels rather eerie due to the sharp lines and gloomy appearance.You also see in these drawings that he did a lot of hatching creating different tones.

Sketch in Letter 542Pen and inkNovember 1885

Rocks and Trees, MontmajourReed pen and ink over graphite on wove paperJuly 1888

Landscape in Stormy WeatherBlack chalk, with white chalk on light grey-blue laid paperJune-August 1885

Pine Trees in the FenPencil, pen and brush in brown ink on wove paperApril 1884

These earlier studies by Vincent Van Gogh has a very different appearance to the later sketches. These ones are much more atmospheric and less defined marks. You are still able to see marks but they are more blended together making them smoother. Personally I prefer Van Gogh’s later style as it’s an interesting way of showing movement: makes you clearly see and feel the way the scene shapes and lives.

Chestnut Trees in Blossom May 1890

Orchard with Peach BlossomApril 1888

Van Gogh also used mark making in his paintings. It gave him a very unique, recognisable style, as he used dashes to mix colours together. Like the drawings, it gives it a sense of movement by having the dashes and marks going in certain directions.

Road with Cypress and StarMay 1890

CypressesJune 1889

These two paintings are very similar but are also very different. For instance, Van Gogh shows the same type of tree in both paints and you can see that they are the same, however, the early one is much more swirled and blended whereas the later one is much more rough and seems to have a faster movement.

Could this possibly have an influence from his mental illnesses? Because he committed suicide two months after this painting.

Olive GroveMid-June 1889

Olive PickingDecember 1889

Again his trees are recognisable. However, by observing the colours, you can tell that they are painted at different times of the year: the December one has a dusk atmosphere whereas the June one looks hot because what appears to be dying grass because of the yellow tones and also the blue sky.

From looking at Vincent Van Gogh’s work I am inspired to create studies which use mark making to show movement. It is effective in his work as you get a sense of feeling that his work is alive as you can follow marks across the page that would change depending on the object it’s representing.

I will definitely be focusing on making landscape studies using pen or pencil, observing the way I feel the landscape moves and use dots and dashes to show it.

I decided to look at Van Gogh’s work in the first place because I was looking at Henry Moore who uses marks to shape objects and figures and I wanted to learn new ways of using mark making.

Bibliography Vincent’s Trees: Paintings and Drawings by Van Gogh – Ralph Skea