Question: I need criticism on the painting, Starry Night, by van Gogh.
First, when considering 'art' criticism, this can mean anything from a review of a new gallery opening in the newspaper to a 100 page thesis on an ancient sculpture, so what you really need is opinion about the meaning of a work of art and the artwork's ability to portray that meaning to viewers. There are a number of resources to use, and they differ for the type of art and for the time period in which the art was produced.
With Starry Night, we luck out because it is a popular, i.e. well-known, work and its creator was a crazy, intriguing guy whom lots of people attempt to pin down. A favorite set for later art is Modern Arts Criticism. While its name sounds as though it consists of only more recent work, it actually includes major artists working after the advent of the camera, a date to which many attribute the beginning of the modern era. At any rate, that means van Gogh is included. Entries are by artist but titles of individual works are in bold type so that it's easy to find criticism on individual's works, including Starry Night.
Another important hint about van Gogh – he’s almost always found under G rather than V. Keep this in mind with all resources. The explanation is long but basically it has to do with his Dutch origin and what van actually means.
With this in mind, we turn to the awesome Grove’s Dictionary of Art where in the g-section, we find van Gogh with an annotated chronology or a timeline of how his art evolved, and a full, concise biography.
Finally, to see what the latter day smarties are saying about Starry Night, check out our online journal/magazine databases. The best for this particular assignment is from EBSCO – Academic Search Elite; it includes full text articles from Art Bulletin, Art History, Art in America, Art Journal, Art News, and Artforum International. Here is a helpful hint for searching in EBSCO databases – immediately change your search to ‘All Words’ rather than the default ‘Standard Search.’
Remember that for different art works and different periods, the sources are going to differ slightly, but using the library catalog, the databases mentioned above, and asking your friendly resident knowledge gurus at the Library can help you get started!
Also, if the art work you’re researching is owned by a public institution, rather than a private collector, you might find information on the art work on that museum’s Web site. You can use The World’s Master Paintings to search by artist to find out which work is living where, and then you can visit that museum’s Web site and read the information they’ve put together. In regard to Starry Night, MOMA, The Museum of Modern Art, has a nice picture and a couple of paragraphs about Starry Night, including an excerpt from van Gogh’s own letter to his brother about the dark night.
Finally, don’t forget that all this is opinion and you should include your opinion too!