The Last Starry Night by Jamison Odone is the kind of graphic novel that if you want a biography, this is not it. Yet, if you want a poetic love letter of admiration to the man, Vincet van Gogh, then this is it. There are facts intermixed with a story about a man doing the thing called life, but they make the main part of things the few months before the end of his life.
What we are given is almost a day to day look at events. We see how, once he left Saint-Paul asylum in 1890, he lived with a family at an inn, and how his routine would show how he stayed sane in the middle of the insanity. Of course, as we know, he did not fare well. We see a few of his friends, loved ones and how the art would shape him and others around him. We see the nightmares, the highs and the lows. Occasionally a piece of Van Gogh’s work is intermixed with the everyday elements (tables, chairs, people, flowers, etc). Part of the narrative is the letters to van Gogh and from him to his family. Everything mixes together in a unique and cleverly done piece of art in itself
This is all created in images that are dark, with light. Blue (dark usually), browns and yellow-brown are the main colors used. Red also plays a large and important part. Details are realistic-abstract with the illustrations. The cover is a good example of what is inside. Some triggers: mental health, blood, attempted suicide, suicide, death
