Doctor: I just wondered, between you and me, in a hundred words where do you think van Gogh rates in the history of art?
Mr. Black: Well, um - big question - um but, to me van Gogh is the finest painter of them all. Certainly the most popular great painter of all time, the most beloved. His command of color - the most magnificent. He transformed the pain of his tormented life into ecstatic beauty. Pain is easy to portray, but to use your passion and pain to portray the ecstasy, and joy, and magnificence of our world… no one had ever done it before. Perhaps no one ever will again. To my mind, that strange, wild man who roamed the fields of Provence was not only the worlds’ greatest artists but also one of the greatest men who ever lived.

(via faysbook)