I look at Van Gogh's Starry Night every day. From what I understand, he was in confinement for a mental condition when he painted this. The year was 1889.
I was in Johnstown, PA in May of 2000 for the 111th anniversary of the Johnstown Flood [May 31, 1889]. It was quite moving. I was seated in the theatre watching the disaster unfold at 3:15pm, the exact time the dam failed. Over 2000 luminery candles lined the breastwork of what was left of the dam. They planned to light them all at dusk. One for each soul lost that day. I didn't stay, but followed the path of the water into Johnstown itself.
The town was eerily vacant. There was a baseball game going on. Maybe that's where everyone was. No matter. I walked out to the point where the Little Conemaugh River and Stoney Creek merge. The epicenter of a tragedy. Just beyond the point is the stone bridge that backed-up and created a dam of debris that day. In the night the debris caught fire. Survivors thought it the fires of hell on earth. I think they were right.
From that point one gets a pretty good view of the city and the valley that delivered this strange being called Flood, that moved into everyone's life and altered their inner landscapes forever. Not hard to fill in the blanks. It was a humbling experience. Memorable. I went home.
The next morning I looked at Van Gogh again. But this time something hit me. Something strangely familiar. 1889. Perhaps it was just one of those coincidences. Perhaps, I was imagining things. Where was Van Gogh at the time? Did he know about this flood? Had he seen pictures? Because the valley in the painting is the one I had seen the day before. Were those clouds or roiling waters flowing down the mountain? Was that Johnstown? Was that towering black flame the fires of hell on earth that survivors talked about later? I don't know.
All I know is that when I see this painting, I see Johnstown. When I see it, I find myself believing that someone with roots in another world astral-traveled to a desperate town. Then that someone gathered the feel and the memory of that place and immortalized it in a painting. Maybe, maybe not. I just know what I see ...and I know how it feels.
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