But, even in Brixton, Vincent was sketching and we do get to see some examples of his work on stage. Actor Philip Cumbus, who plays Vincent in the play, has to do some sketching himself.
“Philip has to sketch a pair of boots,” Rowe explains. “He did not get any special training, he just did it himself. He is getting quite good at it.”
In the play, Vincent is as we know him with a ginger beard. Did he have a beard at that age? “Oh, I don’t really know,” declares Rowe. “There is a photograph of him at 16 when he is, if course, clean shaven. But all the later self portraits show him with a beard so that is what we have done.”
Eventually, while we know something about Van Gogh’s stay in Brixton, there remain these intriguing gaps. If it did not happen quite as Nicholas Wright suggests, perhaps it should have done.
VINCENT in Brixton opens at the Liverpool Everyman on Tuesday, and runs until April 21.
