Did Vincent Van Gogh have autism?

[Aspie_With_Attitude]

A while back I did a bit of research on Van Gogh's behaviour to determine whether if he was autistic or not. It seems rather trivial since in my video that I did show common knowledge that autism diagnosis never existed in the 1880's. However it is, all his psychiatric records had been kept when he was locked up in the asylum back in the late 1880's.

 

[Mia]

I liked your interpretation of Van Gogh's difficulties and great talent, Aspie with Attitude. His use of colour in his paintings is incredible and there are few artists who can compare to his use of colour.

Another thing you might keep in mind about Van Gogh is that he used mainly oil paint and watercolour. Oil paint in his era had quite a bit of lead in it, and artists were exposed to a great deal of it. Often they licked their brushes to point them, and took in small amounts of paint orally.

There was lead in most wallpaper glues and internal house paints as well. This, along with his other difficulties, may have been part of the reason he had bouts of anger and meltdowns. Lead poisoning exposure can cause many difficulties. So along with his lead exposure, his epilepsy and other health problems, it is possible that he was autistic.

 

[Shamar]

A while back I did a bit of research on Van Gogh's behaviour to determine whether if he was autistic or not. It seems rather trivial since in my video that I did show common knowledge that autism diagnosis never existed in the 1880's. However it is, all his psychiatric records had been kept when he was locked up in the asylum back in the late 1880's.

Interesting analysis. I have seen a lot of psychological studies of historical figures, but unfortunately, it must all be regarded as speculation. When given a psychological exam, dead people tend to be decidedly uncooperative.

 

[Mary Terry]

I liked your interpretation of Van Gogh's difficulties and great talent, Aspie with Attitude. His use of colour in his paintings is incredible and there are few artists who can compare to his use of colour.

Another thing you might keep in mind about Van Gogh is that he used mainly oil paint and watercolour. Oil paint in his era had quite a bit of lead in it, and artists were exposed to a great deal of it. Often they licked their brushes to point them, and took in small amounts of paint orally.

There was lead in most wallpaper glues and internal house paints as well. This, along with his other difficulties, may have been part of the reason he had bouts of anger and meltdowns. Lead poisoning exposure can cause many difficulties. So along with his lead exposure, his epilepsy and other health problems, it is possible that he was autistic.

No one will ever know if Van Gogh was autistic but lead poisoning is no joke. Many years ago, I was involved in litigation against embroidery thread manufacturers on behalf of Hispanic women in Texas who embroidered for a living. You have probably seen beautiful hand-embroidered Mexican textiles and clothing. They licked the threads to make points in order to thread their needles and were heavily exposed to lead, cadmium and other heavy metals used to create the dyes for the thread. The manufacturers, who did not warn consumers that their thread contained toxic metals, settled the lawsuits quickly and confidentially after we produced lab results for our clients' blood.

 

[Tom]

Someone did a study not long ago and asked 60 shrinks to retro-diagnose Vinny. As you might guess they came back with over 40 different (often wildly different) ones.

 

[Judge]

I've always found such discussions to be amusing and lively at times. However neither can I ignore that for many famous personalities who lived in the 20th century and earlier, there's no way to medically confirm whether or not they were on the spectrum of autism.

So we are left to merely speculate, without any conclusive results.

Though if we were to discuss the liability and neurological implications regarding hazards and exposures of lead paint, oh my. I could write a book. But take a sleeping pill instead. More efficient.

Still, I recall having to explain to insurance agents and policyholders just how many toddlers routinely relish teething on a wooden window sill, thickly coated in layers and layers of leaded paint. And how a simple lead paint test done by loss control could make or break your chances of being insured with our company.