the challenge
the challenge
Provide Evidence Based Proof that Vincent Van Gogh Committed Suicide
This is an Open Challenge to Martin Bailey, an investigative journalist and Van Gogh scholar, as well as the many art historians, art critics, museum curators, who have denied the “murder” of Vincent van Gogh as only a “myth,” and a “blasphemy.” World renowned forensic pathologists confirmed that a self-inflicted gunshot wound, without an exit wound, was dubious, if not technically impossible, for any bullet to enter the abdomen, as described by a person of interest, and to follow the unbelievable “magic bullet” ballistic course trajectory to end up where it was believed to end up, despite no evidence that a bullet was removed, and no autopsy performed. Consequently, suicide is untenable. Therefore, these “deniers” of Vincent’s murder must now provide substantive, contemporaneous, evidence-based proof that Vincent van Gogh committed suicide, subject to direct (published) cross-examination, and the use of common sense “Rules of Evidence.”
- Why do the “deniers” keep repeating the same reasons for suicide, when they are easily undermined in the ‘court of public opinion’ or dismissed in a judicial setting?
- What would have to change in the presentation of Van Gogh’s life and art by the Van Gogh Museum or other famous museums like The Metropolitan Museum of Art (Exhibit: “Van Gogh’s Cypresses” 5/22/23 – 8/27/23) or the Chicago Art Institute (Exhibit: “Van Gogh and The Avant-Garde: The Modern Landscape” 5/14/23 – 9/4/23) if murder was accepted as the cause of Van Gogh’s death?
- Given how heavily invested the “Van Gogh Business” is in the suicide narrative, for example, “martyr for his art,” “mad genius,” what would be the repercussions for this “business” if it had to accept and adjust to the forensic conclusion of murder?
- How would Van Gogh enthusiasts change their understanding of Van Gogh as a person and their interpretation of his art if the cause of death was generally accepted to be murder?