Beethoven or Van Gogh?

Question

Who was the artist who cute off his ear in dispare? And what was his mental illness?

Answer 1

Van Gogh wasThere is no consensus on the medical condition of Vincent van Gogh. Many competing hypotheses have been put forward. These include epilepsy, bipolar disorder, sunstroke, acute intermittent porphyria, lead poisoning and Ménière's disease.Various symptoms are described in Van Gogh's letters and other documents such as the asylum register at Saint-Rémy. The symptoms include: poor digestion and a bad stomach, hallucinations, nightmares, stupor, absent mindedness, impotence, insomnia, and anxiety. Van Gogh suffered from some sort of seizures or crises, and in one of these attacks cut off a part of his ear.

One of the most frequent complaints in Van Gogh's letters is the problems he endured with his stomach and digestion.[1] Van Gogh suffered from hallucinations[2] and nightmares at times.[3] He often reported that he was suffering from fever.[4] At various times he reported bouts of insomnia. He was unable to sleep for three weeks prior to his diagnosis of gonorrhea in The Hague.[5] On occasions he sunk into a kind of stupor.[6] Van Gogh reported his impotence to Theo in the summer after he arrived in Arles,[7] and a month later when he wrote to Bernard it seemed to still be very much on his mind.[8] Towards the end of Van Gogh's life he had thoughts of suicide.[9]


[edit] Behavior
Van Gogh indulged to an abnormal degree in various activities which undermined his health, such as constant smoking, drinking alcohol and coffee to excess, and eating very poorly, even fasting at times. The natural consequence of all this was malnutrition. He was never without his pipe and smoked it even on his deathbed, and he admitted on several occasions that he smoked too much.[10] He also frequently drank alcohol to excess; in particular, he often drank absinthe.

There is some evidence that Van Gogh nibbled at his paints, and the eating of paints is possibly connected with his seizure around New Year 1890. In January 1890, after another one of Vincent's seizures, Theo wrote to him saying "if you know that it is dangerous for you to have colours near you, why don't you clear them away for a time, and make drawings?"[11] Theo's alarm is somewhat reduced after hearing from Vincent, and five days later he explained: "In [Doctor Peyron's] first letter he gave me to understand that it was dangerous for you to go on painting, as the colours were poison to you, but he went a little too far, which might have been due to his having relied on unverified rumours, as he himself was ill at the time."[12]


[edit] Diagnoses

[edit] Epilepsy
Epilepsy has been a popular diagnosis. Van Gogh himself thought that he might be an epileptic[13] and his doctor Felix Rey made the same general diagnosis,[14] as did Dr Peyron at St Rémy[15] A diagnosis of temporal lobe epilepsy was originally put forward in 1928 by Leroy and Doiteau[16] and has received much support.[17] Arnold states that the pattern of van Gogh's seizures, their timing and duration, does not fit well with the complex partial seizures associated with temporal lobe epilepsy.[18] Furthermore, it seems that Vincent's condition was controlled by the administration of bromide, which is effective against grand mal seizures, as well as absinthe intoxication and porphyria, but not for temporal lobe epilepsy.[18]


[edit] Bipolar disorder
Perry in 1947 was the first to put together a serious case for a diagnosis of bipolar disorder, or "manic depression."[19] It fits well with the well documented periods of intense activity interspersed with periods of exhaustion and possible depression.[20] It has been suggested that van Gogh was not just bipolar, but that the crises in his last two years were brought about by the additional effect of thujone poisoning from his consumption of absinthe.[21]


[edit] Sunstroke
The idea that van Gogh might have suffered some form of chronic sunstroke was advocated strongly by Roch Grey.[22] Vincent described the effects of the Arles sun in a letter: "Oh! that beautiful midsummer sun here. It beats down on one's head, and I haven't the slightest doubt that it makes one crazy. But as I was so to begin with, I only enjoy it."[23] A month earlier he had mentioned the effects of the sun in passing in a letter to Theo: "Many thanks for your letter, which gave me great pleasure, arriving just exactly at the moment when I was still dazed with the sun and the strain of wrestling with a rather big canvas."[24] A remark has been attributed to Dr Gachet describing a diagnosis of "turpentine poisoning and the effects of too intense sun on a Nordic brain,"[25] but attempts to confirm this attribution have failed.[26]


[edit] Ménière's disease
The hypothesis that Vincent may have suffered from Ménière's disease — a balance disorder of the inner ear which is accompanied by nausea, vomiting, hearing loss, and vertigo — was first published in 1979 by Yasuda.[27] This idea then reappeared in 1990 in the Journal of the American Medical Association (JAMA).[28] Arnold refutes the hypothesis, stating that there is no case for Ménière's, and that the logic of the JAMA article was flawed in that it put forward only epilepsy as an alternative diagnosis.[29] The Ménière's diagnosis relies on interpreting van Gogh's gastrointestinal problems as the nausea and vomiting associated with Ménière's. The JAMA artcle's suggestion that Vincent's cutting of his ear was an attempt at self-performed surgery to relieve the Ménière's symptom of tinnitis has been regarded as far-fetched.[29]


[edit] Lead poisoning
Vincent was reported to nibble at his paints at times; this could account for various forms of metal poisoning. Of the various metals contained in paints, poisoning by lead most closely matches van Gogh's symptoms. Symptoms of lead poisoning include abdominal pain, constipation, vomiting, paralysis or paresis.[30]


[edit] Acute intermittent porphyria
Arnold and Loftus put forward the diagnosis of Acute Intermittent Porphyria (often referred to as simply "AIP").[31] Arnold suggests the AIP was exacerbated by malnutrition and absinthe abuse.[32] He cites two case histories of men in their 30's who were demonstrated to have AIP and displayed some symptoms similar to that of Van Gogh, including depression and hallucinations in one case, and complex partial seizures in the other. However, Erickson refutes this diagnosis arguing that the key symptom of urine discoloration was never noted, and that Van Gogh's "bad stomach" does not match the commonly experienced "excruciating abdominal pain" associated with AIP.[33] Erickson and Arnold disagree as to the support offered by the family history, and in particular regarding the status of Vincent's father's health: Arnold, basing his opinion on Tralbaut, believes Theodorus to have been in not-very-good health for most of his life, whereas Erickson chooses to see him as being essentially an active man until a relatively sudden death at age 63. Arnold suggests that Theodorus' quiet and balanced life meant that he avoided several factors that precipitated symptoms and progress of the disorder in his children.


[edit] Other diagnoses
Van Gogh's primary complaints have also been variously attributed to syphilis and absinthe intoxication.

Answer 2

Van Gogh

Answer 3

Van Gogh was depressed and cut off his ear. Beethoven just lost his hearing.

Answer 4

im pretty sure beethoven was around way before van gogh. i have no idea what eithers mental illnesses were, but i do know the van gogh used to eat his paint (then, full of lead!) and smoked opium. no mental illness there, just a plain old bored and depressed man with nothing really to look forward to in life....and drugs that were then legal! lol

Answer 5

Beethoven merely became deaf at the end of his life. Van Gogh cut off the earlobe of his left ear during some sort of seizure, following a breakdown in his friendship with Paul Gauguin.

"Diagnoses which have been put forward include schizophrenia, bipolar disorder, syphilis, poisoning from swallowed paints, temporal lobe epilepsy and acute intermittent porphyria. Any of these could have been the culprit and been aggravated by malnutrition, overwork, insomnia, and a fondness for alcohol, and absinthe in particular."

"Vincent van Gogh : Medical records" : http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Van_Gogh#Medical_records

"There is no consensus on the medical condition of Vincent van Gogh. Many competing hypotheses have been put forward. These include epilepsy, bipolar disorder, sunstroke, acute intermittent porphyria, lead poisoning and Ménière's disease."

"Vincent van Gogh's medical condition" : http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Vincent_van_Gogh%27s_medical_condition

Answer 6

Van Gogh.

Answer 7

Vincent van Gogh, cut off his ear in despair, not Ludwig van Beethoven.

Answer 8

Van Gogh cut off his ear and it wasn't from a mental illness. it was a creepy way of proving his love to his landlords daughter. He actually did a self portrait without his ear.

Answer 9

Both are Van Gogh! Beethoven was deaf.

Answer 10

Cory D is right. Most art, photograpy, etc. is public domain after 75 years. Someone may somehow have gotten the copyright extended - check on it in particular. If you just draw or paint something INSPIRED by Starry Night I think that you can get away with it. If you are slavishly copying Starry Night for your own illustration, I think that it would seem "cheesy" and unimaginitive and would not be well received by a publisher or a viewer.

Answer 11

van gogh