This brief biographical study of Van Gogh pays particular attention to the dynamics of his psychological illness and its relation to his art. The major causes of the illness were his 'father complex', a tendency to schizophrenia in his family, and a mixture of introversive and extraversive tendencies. The artist's decompensation was precipitated by disappointments in his relations with women beginning at about age twenty-one. Later, exacerbations of his illness occurred when his heterosexual and homosexual libidinal impulses were frustrated. The devotion and sympathy of his brother Theo was therapeutic. Theo was Van Gogh's substitute father. Holstijn compares the behavior of Theo toward Vincent with the psychotherapeutic methods of Rosen, Sechehaye, and Schwing.