Why did Paul Gauguin and Vincent van Gogh often argue while living together in Arles?

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Self-portrait painting by Paul Gauguin showing the artist with a mustache, yellow halo, and stylized plants against a vivid orange background with green and red fruit. — Paul Gauguin Self-portrait by Paul Gauguin, oil on wood, 1889; in the Chester Dale Collection, National Gallery of Art, Washington, D.C. 79.2 × 51.3 cm.

When Paul Gauguin moved to Arles in 1888 to stay with Vincent van Gogh, the two artists—both described as volatile—frequently engaged in heated arguments regarding the fundamental purpose of art.1

While van Gogh had hoped to establish a "Studio of the South" as a collaborative space for like-minded painters to create a new, expressive form of art, his relationship with Gauguin quickly became tumultuous. Their disagreements were rooted in their differing artistic philosophies and temperaments, ultimately leading to a short, two-month stay that ended abruptly following a violent incident involving the mutilation of van Gogh’s ear.1