Willemina Jacoba van Gogh

Willemina Jacoba van Gogh (March 16, 1862 - May 17, 1941),^[1] called Wil, was the youngest sister of the artist Vincent van Gogh and the art dealer Theo van Gogh. She was amongst the earliest feminists.

[edit] Life

During the first part of her life, Willemina van Gogh served her family and others, nursing the sick. After the death of her brothers in 1890, she got a modest job in a hospital. Then she engaged in the committee to organise the "National exhibition of women's work" (Nationale Tentoonstelling van Vrouwenarbeid), 1898. This was a a highly successful enterprise, and funds raised from the exhibition, 20,000 Dutch Guilders, served to establish the Dutch National bureau for women's work.

No sources record what happened afterwards, but on December 4, 1902, Van Gogh was interned and later transferred to House Veldwijk, a psychiatric institution at Ermelo. The diagnosis of dementia praecox, on which this measure was based, was in these years equal to a sentence of death. Van Gogh dwelt at Ermelo for almost four decades, before she died.

Whether she was mentally ill or not, is nowadays difficult to prove. Renate Berger has established that she shared the fate of many "sisters of well-known men" of these decades.

[edit] Notes

[edit] References

• Anonymous (initialled "H.H.H." and "W.F.d.C.H."): Van Gogh, 's-Gravenhage, Nederland's Patriciaat 50, 1964, pp. 171-183
• Berger, Renate: Willemina Jacoba van Gogh (1862-1941): "Du bist sehr tapfer, liebe Schwester", in: Schwestern berühmter Männer. Zwölf biographische Porträts, ed. Luise F. Pusch, Insel, Frankfurt am Main, 1985, pp. 453-485 ISBN 3-458-32496-8

[edit] External links

• Yuri Visser: Willemina van Gogh, in Dutch

v • d • e Vincent van Gogh General Biography · Chronology · Medical condition · Posthumous fame · Cultural depictions · List of works · Post-Impressionism · Family Theo van Gogh · Wil van Gogh · Johanna van Gogh-Bonger · Andries Bonger · Theo van Gogh (film director) · Anton Mauve Friends Anthon van Rappard · Paul Gachet · Paul Gauguin · Émile Bernard · John Peter Russell · Eugène Boch · Anna Boch Groups of works Self-Portraits · Portraits · Flowering Orchards · The Décoration for the Yellow House · The Roulin Family · The Wheat Field · Copies after Millet, and others · Display at Les XX, 1890 · Auvers size 30 canvases · Auvers Double-squares and Squares Paintings The Potato Eaters · Sunflowers · The Night Café · The Yellow House · Cafe Terrace at Night · Starry Night Over the Rhone · The Bedroom · L'Arlésienne · The Red Vineyard · Les Arènes · View of Arles, Flowering Orchards · Ivy · The Starry Night · At Eternity's Gate · Irises · Portrait of Dr. Gachet · The Church at Auvers · Wheatfield with Crows · Daubigny's Garden · Thatched Cottages by a Hill · White House at Night Other works Drawings and water-colours · Prints Public collections Van Gogh Museum · Kröller-Müller Museum · Musée d'Orsay Wikimedia  van Gogh at Wiktionary ·  van Gogh at Wikibooks ·  van Gogh at Wikiquote ·  van Gogh at Wikisource ·  van Gogh at Commons ·  van Gogh at Wikinews