Curated by art historian Sjraar van Heugten, former head of collections at Amsterdam’s Van Gogh Museum, the National Gallery of Victoria’s winter exhibition Van Gogh and the Seasons is more than a set of postcard-pretty pictures; the theme is thoughtfully chosen to reflect the artist’s deep and abiding interest in nature and the changing seasons, where he saw God at work.
Van Heugten borrowed from 20 private lenders and public institutions to build the exhibition, which features almost 50 paintings subdivided into seasons, as well as a selection of the Japanese woodcuts that inspired Van Gogh, and extractions from his large collection of prints of works by the masters (or as he called it, an artist’s “bible”).
Below are four paintings from the exhibition alongside insights from the curator. But first, a primer to help you impress your date and avoid some common faux pas:
10 things to know about Van Gogh
- The correct pronunciation – i.e. the Dutch pronunciation – is ‘fun gokh’. But English-speakers find the ‘kh’ sound difficult, and even Dutch curator Sjraar van Heugten says ‘Vahn Goff’ is okay.
- He was born on March 30, 1853 in the southern Netherlands.
- His father was a Protestant Minister, and he grew up believing that God is manifest in nature. Even when his fervent Christianity faded, his belief in the divinity of nature endured.
- He tried his hand at being a preacher (in Belgium) and an art dealer before heading to art school in his early 30s.
- He was hugely influenced by Japanese woodblock prints, and collected them. It was partly the colour he was drawn to, partly the composition, and partly the sense of serenity.
- His career only spanned a decade, cut short by his death in 1890, at the age of 37.
- He didn’t adopt the bright colours and impasto technique we now associate him with until relatively late in that career.
- Contrary to popular conception, he was not a poor and starving artist – thanks to his brother Theo, who had a very good income and was able to send him money.
- The myth of Van Gogh as a ‘crazy’, tortured artist is also incorrect. Van Heugten says: “He was a man who thought very clearly about his art, both in content and in stylistic terms; he was quite systematic in his approach. If he had been the tortured artist he would never have been able to make 850 paintings and 1200 drawings in just a ten year career.”
- He was not committed to an asylum; his spells in hospitals were voluntary.
And what about that ‘ear’ incident? There are competing theories, but van Heugten describes it as the product of a confrontation Van Gogh had with artist Paul Gauguin, his flatmate at the time. “He cut off his left ear. After that he became ill, and had to be hospitalised several times.”
Four paintings explained:
1. The green vineyard
Van Heugten considers this painting of the grape harvest to be one of the artist’s most impressive – not just in the exhibition, but in his career. He points to the heavy impasto brushstrokes, which are nevertheless “contained”, marshalled into this wonderfully expressive image. “This technique is so immensely difficult to achieve,” the curator marvels. “It’s really very hard to use impasto and keep it lively and varied, and achieve this beautiful colour composition – and at the same time create the impression of vines that are almost growing out of the painting.” It was the first time Van Gogh had seen the harvest of the grapes. “To do such a unique painting, so strong – that’s simply remarkable.”
Van Gogh was a pioneer of the impasto technique of applying paint, which he discovered less than three years before his death.
2. Wheatfield
This painting is rarely lent by the Honolulu Museum of Art, because it’s their only Van Gogh. It was painted in June, when the wheat was being harvested in Arles, which “drove him into a frenzy of painting,” says van Heugten. “This motive of the wheat sheafs was very meaningful for Van Gogh, because he saw in this a symbol of infinity; the growing of the wheat and the harvest was an important cycle that represented the seasonal cycle, but also the work of the peasant.”
This painting also demonstrates Van Gogh’s masterful use of colour, and his interest in ‘complementary colour’ contrasts. “In this painting, yellow and purple are used to almost push the sheaves of wheat forward, give the painting depth and expression,” van Heugten explains. “Van Gogh was a master of using these strong contrasts so that they were not disturbing, but gave paintings that extra special touch.”
3. The garden of the asylum at Saint-Rémy
This painting was made just after Van Gogh moved into the asylum; his last months in Arles had been very tumultuous: there was the incident of the confrontation with Paul Gauguin, after which he cut off his own ear; then he was ill, and hospitalised several times – and his neighbours turned against him. “He was depressed about the idea of going to the asylum,” says van Heugten, “but then when he got there he found it was much nicer than he’d expected, and there were people who were fairly functional, whom he could get along with.”
He also discovered that the asylum had a huge garden, which allowed him to paint without the necessity of going outside the grounds. He’d missed much of spring because of his illness, and was delighted to find the trees still flowering, and flowers in full bloom.
Van Heugten says “this is one of the best paintings he made; it’s not one of the most famous, but people are often quite overwhelmed standing in front of it. I always tell people to seek it out.” He also points out that it’s been restored so that it looks almost exactly as the artist intended it. The fact that it is signed indicates it was an important work to him.
4. Snow-covered field with a harrow
This is a copy of a painting by Van Gogh’s favourite painter, Jean-François Millet. “Millet was a kind of hero for Van Gogh,” says van Heugten. “He also, like Van Gogh, was a painter peasant life.” When Van Gogh started out, he “copied endlessly” prints by famous artists; nine years later, when he was ill, he took that up again. This painting was done while he was in the asylum at Saint-Rémy. Most paintings from that time were small, but this depiction of the bare fields in winter is unusually large – and indicates it was an important to him.
Looking at the painting, van Heugten laments how the organic pigments used by the artist have faded over 127 years. “It’s now more greenish than it should be – there used to be more red in it. There’s not a single work by Van Gogh that hasn’t altered over time; it’s true for every painting, but especially paintings with organic pigments.”
Read our interview with the curator of Van Gogh and the Seasons – and catch the exhibition before it closes on July 9.
See what else is on with our hit list of the best art in Melbourne this month.