You can’t grow up in the Netherlands without feeling Vincent van Gogh in the air.
He’s in the museums, the postcards, the fields. But more than that, he’s in the emotion.

For Ruben, a rising abstract artist from Haarlem, Van Gogh has always been more than a historical figure. He’s a kindred spirit. A reminder that art isn’t meant to be understood, it’s meant to be felt. The brushwork, the color intensity, the emotional layering, it may be abstract, but it’s undeniably human.

Where It All Connects: Texture, Emotion, and Fearlessness

Like Van Gogh, Ruben paints from the inside out. He isn’t trying to represent a scene or object, he’s capturing the emotional frequency of a moment. Both artists are obsessed with texture and use color as language.

In works like Madrid or Buenos Aires, you can feel the urgency. The texture is raw, layered, almost sculptural, echoing Van Gogh’s thick, impasto style where paint becomes presence.

Fun fact: Van Gogh used such heavy brushstrokes that some paintings have over 3mm of layered oil paint, almost like low-relief sculpture. Ruben’s acrylic textures follow a similar philosophy: emotion has depth.

A Shared Restlessness: The Artist as Traveler

While Ruben was born in Haarlem, his creative path has been shaped by movement. Like Van Gogh, who wandered through the Netherlands, Belgium, and France, Ruben follows the call of new environments, letting each place mark his palette.

Now based in Barcelona, Ruben paints with the openness of a traveler: observing, absorbing, transforming. His pieces hold traces of everywhere he’s been, not in literal scenes, but in energy, tone, and temperature.

“Movement changes my art. Each city teaches me something new about light, rhythm, and emotion.” – Ruben van Stegeren

This nomadic spirit links him to Van Gogh not just in style, but in philosophy. Both artists see life as a journey worth documenting, through brushstrokes, through risk, through color.

It’s Not About Repeating the Past, It’s About Channeling the Same Fire

Ruben doesn’t try to copy or even compare to Van Gogh. That would be impossible.
But he carries the same torch: art that dares to feel too much.

“Great things are not done by impulse, but by a series of small things brought together.” – Van Gogh