Van Gogh On His Portraits

This quote from Van Gogh is more than a hundred years old, so now we can say that his wish came true:

"I would like to make portraits that people a hundred years on will see as apparitions."

(-Vincent Van Gogh, quoted in; p.183, Van Gogh by Pierre Cabanne.)

His subjects do seem like ghosts staring at you through the depths of time. He captured a vibrancy not only in nature, but in the people he painted also. Especially in his self-portraits, he captured that sense of viewing apparitions as he says. (I am not sure that's what he meant in the preceding quote, but it's true.)