Van Gogh’s Brokenness: What We All Get Wrong About His Famous Ear Incident
I am looking forward to reading Russ Ramsey’s latest book, “Van Gogh Has a Broken Heart.” Pastor Ramsey has been making the rounds with interviews to promote the book, a promising follow up to his Rembrandt is in the Wind book. During his interview with Stephen Roach (Makers & Mystics), he had something potent to say about Van Gogh’s famous ear-cutting-off story.
Ramsey says that if you ask someone on the street, “what can you tell me about Vincent Van Gogh,” they’ll tell you 2 things:
He painted Starry Night.
He cut off his ear.
He calls these answers unfortunate because, he says, “the episode of him cutting off his ear was the lowest point in his entire life. It was a moment of incredible shame, incredible brokenness and fear. He was a terrified, broken, hurting person when that happened. And it becomes something people joke about.”
He says Scripture is filled with people who “are known by the things dragging them down.”
So, what does this painting have to teach us about our own brokenness?
Self Portrait With Bandaged Ear
Van Gogh painted numerous self portraits during his lifetime. Ramsey indicates he painted this days after cutting off his ear while he resided in an asylum hospital. It is a painting of “him telling the truth about how broken, desperate, needy and wounded he is.”
Ramsey applauds Van Gogh’s courage and honesty in painting such a portrait. I find Ramsey’s take away helpful for my own life. He says, “I want to be like that in the sense that I want to be somebody who is willing to let the wounded side of me be seen.”
For these reasons, Ramsey has this painting on the wall of his offices to remind him of the kind of pastor he wants to be and the kind of people he wants his church to be.
Self Portrait with Bandaged Ear
Vincent Van Gogh, 1889.
