Daily Mail : Reincarnation of Vincent Van Gogh

5 novembre 2013

The man who turned into Vincent: Artist who shares birthday with Van Gogh transforms himself into tortured genius

Damon Farkas created the stunning living art work with his fiancée
He shares a birthday with the iconic post-impressionist painter
Pictures of the 25-year-old's amazing transformation have gone viral

PUBLISHED: 08:42 GMT, 3 November 2013 | UPDATED: 10:01 GMT, 3 November 2013

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An artist became a work of art himself, by transforming into Van Gogh's self portrait.

Damon Farkas, 25, from Virginia, US, used make-up and his creative skills to make himself look like he had walked straight out of the canvas.

His make-up artist fiancée Carolina Pereira, 22, came up with the inspired idea because Mr Farkas shares a birthday with the iconic post-impressionist painter.

Damon Farkas was in a hurry when he created this stunning Halloween costume

He decided on the creative tribute as his Halloween costume after getting home late from a business trip

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After deciding on the costume, Mr Farkas raced to the shops to buy a jacket similar to the one worn by Van Gogh in the famous self portrait.

He then took step-by-step photographs of his transformation and even posed in front of a print of Van Gogh's The Starry Night for a final picture.

Mr Farkas posted Instagram pictures of every stage of his amazing transformation into Vincent Van Gogh

He said: 'Van Gogh is hands down my favorite artist.

'Although my artist style doesn't reflect his my love for him is more aimed towards his story. I have Asperger's syndrome and I associated a lot with his work and the way he was always labeled weird or strange.

'His paintings and the little bit of life that we've learned is oddly comforting for me because I believe I'll never be famous for my art but it will never stop me from creating art.

I make art because I feel passion has kind of been lost on the youth, so I've made it my job to try and reach out to as many people I can to help and motivate them to create and try new things.

'Besides the love for art, Van Gogh and I share a birthday and a pretty epic ginger beard.'

The finished Van Gogh costume, created by Damon Farkas and his fiancée Carolina Pereira

A self portrait (left) by Vincent Van Gogh and (right) Damon Farkas' creative tribute to the influential artist

He added: It was actually my fiancée who came up with idea for the costume.

'I go out of town quite a lot for work and had to come up with an idea quickly for the party. I went and bought a ladies' jacket because it was the only thing I could find that looked like the one in the painting.'

By day the artist works as an intelligence analyst on US government contracts, but he started painting three years ago as a way to express himself.

Like Van Gogh, Mr Farkas has also painted a self portrait, as well as lifelike images of pop culture stars including actor Edward Norton and model Ricki Hall.

Damon Farkas creating an image of Fight Club star Edward Norton

Mr Farkas adds the finishing touches to an image of Edward Norton (left) and (right) his drawing of Ricki Hall

And after sharing his costume on Instagram and the user generated news site Reddit, Mr Farkas' work has gone viral.

He said: 'The response to the pictures has been great, particularly from Instagram page @art_collective who are the biggest supporters of unknown artists and have done amazing things people like me.'

Mr Farkas used his skills to make this beautiful image of his make-up artist fiancée Carolina Pereira

He added: 'Somehow over night the make up went viral and I honestly couldn't believe it!

'There are so many amazing makeup artists out there, and my sloppy, rushed, drunken makeup job just hit all the right notes for people and ended up popping up all over the place.

'Art is such a strange beast.'