The lives of many famous artists have been shrouded in mystery and conjecture, but none have been more controversial than the life of Vincent van Gogh.

Remembered for his swirling brushstrokes and burning colors, Vincent van Gogh is today one of the best-known painters. Though his career as a painter spanned less than ten years, he produced a body of work that remains one of the most enduring in all of modern art. In his lifetime, however, he received little recognition. Today his paintings sell for countless millions, yet during his lifetime, van Gogh managed to sell just one painting.

Van Gogh’s road to becoming a painter took a circuitous, often troublesome path. In his twenties, van Gogh served as a lay minister in a Belgian mining district. He practiced Christian virtues with such outward zeal that he found himself ostracized from society, which prompted him to set off for Brussels to study art. His religious zeal, his belief in the unimpeachable nature of man and his struggle, and his many tumultuous inner-turmoils all resonate through his extraordinary body of paintings.