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1819–1907: Anna van Gogh-Carbentus (mother)
Anna Cornelia Carbentus was born on 10 September 1819 in The Hague. Her father was a successful bookbinder. Among other things, he had bound the first Constitution and was therefore entitled to use the title ‘royal’. Yet it was not a trouble-free family. Her father and some of the children in the family were said to be ‘mentally ill’. As a result, Anna would worry throughout her life about her own mental health and, once she became a mother, about that of her children. Among them was Vincent.
On 21 May 1851, Anna married Theodorus (Dorus) van Gogh at the Kloosterkerk in The Hague. She began her married life in the vicarage at Zundert, her husband’s first post. It was quite a change, moving from stately The Hague to the Catholic countryside of Brabant. Her first child was stillborn in 1852. A year later, Vincent was born – the future painter. The family then steadily grew to include Anna (1855), Theo (1857), Lies (1859), Wil (1862) and Cor (1867). As a minister’s wife, she devoted herself to helping poor families, for example by preparing meals for them. As well as looking after her family and the household – with the help of a few maids – she spent her time gardening, drawing and painting in watercolours, knitting and writing letters. So Vincent certainly didn’t have to learn these things from a stranger.
Her husband’s profession took Anna and her family from Zundert to Helvoirt in 1871, to Etten four years later, and to Nuenen in 1882. When Dorus died unexpectedly in March 1885, Anna continued to live there for another year. She then moved with her youngest daughter, Wil, to Breda, where her sister Cornelie lived. The other children had all left home by then. In October 1888, Vincent painted a beautiful portrait of Anna in France, as he remembered her, using a portrait photograph as a reference and depicting her wearing a mourning bonnet following the death of ‘Dad’. In November 1889, Anna settled in Leiden with Wil. It was there, in the summer of 1890, that she received the news that Vincent had died in Auvers-sur-Oise. Anna died ‘after a long illness’ on 29 April 1907, aged 87.
His mother (and father) found it difficult to cope with a son who regularly embarrassed them. Yet they continued to support their son. They helped him find odd jobs and always offered him a place to stay when he needed it. When his mother was confined to the house in Nuenen in 1884 with a broken leg, Vincent painted the Protestant church to cheer her up. He chose the subject with care: after all, his father was a minister at this church. Following his father’s death, Vincent adapted the painting. He added autumn leaves to the bare winter trees. He also included small groups of churchgoers, some in mourning attire.
Anna loved her children dearly. This included Vincent, the most difficult of her children. After Vincent had moved to France, he wrote several letters to his mother. This allowed him to keep up to date with how she was getting on and to hear the latest family news. Vincent seemed to be homesick for Brabant. In 1888, for example, he asked his mother to send him some drawings from Etten. Based on these – and influenced by Paul Gauguin – he lovingly painted ‘Memories of the Garden in Etten’, featuring, amongst others, Anna and his sister Wil. It was intended to be hung in his bedroom.
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Sources:
Digital Lexicon of Women in the Netherlands, Lodewijk Kallenberg.
N.A. van Beek, The Notes of Aunt Mietje van Gogh (The Hague 2010).
Willem-Jan Verlinden, The Van Gogh Sisters (Amsterdam 2016).
Lodewijk Kallenberg, ‘Anna Cornelia van Gogh-Carbentus, Vincent van Gogh’s mother. Her life and her connection with Leiden’, Leids Jaarboekje 111 (2019) 84–97.