Post mortem praise is not success, it's an extended eulogy by people that didn't even know you, which you can't bask in anymore anyway.
The optimal life of an artist would be one like Pablo Picassos (without the woman beating) or Salvador Dalis. Everybody knew them, everybody loved (or pretended to love) their art and they died at a ripe old age enabling them to create a lot of works in differing styles. Van Gogh is the exact opposite, he died young (by 7mm pinfire revolver), he got no pussy and nobody except for his brother, who also died young (ironically because he got pussy, just the syphillis infected variety) cared about his art or even understood him. That's a sad, horrifying, failed existence. I'm not even making a value judgement here, I actually like his paintings.