Some say that madness and genius (天才) often come hand in hand. This is especially true of the Dutch painter Vincent Van Gogh.

Van Gogh is famous for  1. amazing use of color and shape. Born in 1853, he was painting at a time when art was changing. A long time ago, artists tried to make their paintings look real like photographs.  2. later on, art became more about the artist’s own ideas. If you see a Van Gogh, it won’t look like the real world. It will look even  3. (beautiful).

Some of Van Gogh’s most famous paintings are of natural scenes and flowers, such as Sunflowers. He also painted many wonderful self-portraits (自画像),4. brought him a lot of fame. Van Gogh had a great gift for painting; however, he was a 5. (trouble) man. At one point, he cut off  his own ear.

Van Gogh is now one of the world’s most famous artists. But he died at the age of 37, alone and poor. Almost 6. knew or cared about his art at that time. Although he was a great genius, he suffered  7. (great). Some say that his madness was  8. he paid for his art.

Actually, if Van Gogh  9.(die) at the age of twenty, no one would have connected him with failure or mental illness. Instead he would have been remembered by those close to him 10. a dutiful son .