Lessons of Van Gogh
Peer Collaboration

Guillaumin has sounder ideas than the others, and I believe that as a man, he has better ideas than the rest. If we all embody his qualities, we would produce more good things and have less time and inclination to be at each other's throats or indulge in futile conflicts.

… I believe that the first condition for success is to put aside petty jealousies; only unity can provide strength. It's well worth sacrificing selfishness, in favor of the common interest.

Perhaps there would be a real advantage for many artists who love the sun and color to emigrate to the south.

Indeed, it is a great reason to regret the absence of a shared loyalty among artists, who incessantly criticize and persecute each other, yet fortunately, they fail in canceling each other out.

Ah, if several painters agreed to collaborate on great things. The art of the future might be able to show us examples of that. The thing is, for the paintings that are needed now, there would have to be several of us in order to cope with the material difficulties. Well — alas — we’re not at that point — the art of painting doesn’t move as fast as literature.

My dear old Bernard — by collaboration I did not mean that in my opinion two or more painters should work on the same paintings. I rather wanted to understand by that divergent works, but which stand together and complement each other. Let's see the Italian primitives and the German primitives and the Dutch school and the Italians proper, finally, let's see all the painting.

​Then there is the fact that the material difficulties of the painter's life make collaboration, the union of painters desirable ... By saving their material lives, by loving each other like friends instead of getting at each other's throats, painters would be happier and in any case less ridiculous, less foolish and less guilty. However, I do not insist, knowing that life takes us so quickly that we do not have time to discuss and act at the same time. Therefore, currently, the union [of painters] exists only very incompletely, we sail on the high seas in our small and wicked boats isolated on the great waves of our time.

… I really dare to believe that those who love artistic work will see their productive capacities develop in the south, but watch your blood, and beware of everything else.

The idea of creating a kind of freemasonry of painters does not please me enormously. I deeply despise regulations, institutions, etc. In short, I'm looking for something other than dogmas, which, far from settling things, only cause endless disputes. It is a sign of decadence. However, a union of painters still exists only in a vague but very broad sketch state, so let us calmly let what must happen, happen. It will be more beautiful if it crystallizes naturally; the more we talk about it, the less it happens.

... it's better on both sides to try to exchange good things than to do them too hastily. Sometimes it is better for both sides to seek to exchange good things than to do them too hastily.

I have long been touched by the fact that Japanese artists have very often practiced the exchange between them. This proves that they loved each other and held each other and that there was a certain harmony between them and that they lived precisely in a kind of fraternal life naturally and not in intrigues. The more we resemble them in this respect, the better off we will be.