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MEXICO CITY, Jul 15, 2006 (UPI via COMTEX) -- The famously chaotic brushstrokes in Vincent van Gogh's later paintings may provide insights into the complex science of turbulence, a Mexican study says.
The Times of London said physicists believe that van Gogh's later paintings portray eerily accurate pictures of turbulence, the phenomenon behind cloud formations, the flow of ocean currents and bumpy aircraft rides.
Three of van Gogh's works, "A Starry Night," "Road with Cypress" and "Star and Wheat Field with Crows," were painted at the end of van Gogh's life, when he was reportedly suffering from long bouts of epilepsy.
A doctor who treated the artist noted that van Gogh's seizures involved "acute mania with hallucinations of sight and hearing," which Van Gogh described as "the storm within".
José Luis Aragón, a physicist at the National Autonomous University of Mexico, aided by mathematicians from Spain and Oxford, has been researching the phenomenon behind van Gogh's later works.
URL: www.upi.com Copyright 2006 by United Press International
