The National Gallery in London is dedicating a major retrospective to Vincent van Gogh from September 14, exhibiting three of the Dutch painter’s major works, conceived as a triptych but never shown together.
Titled Van Gogh : Poets and Lovers (Van Gogh: Poets and Lovers), the exhibition focuses on the post-impressionist painter’s output during the two years – between February 1888 and May 1890 – that he spent in the south of France, in Arles and Saint-Rémy-de-Provence.
The exhibition brings together around fifty paintings and drawings, which demonstrate Van Gogh’s talent for arousing emotions through his subtle and intense play of colours. Many are already well-known masterpieces, such as The Starry Nightbut some had never left their original private collections or museums.
In one of the rooms with yellow walls, three paintings are exhibited: two Sunflowersone belonging to the National Gallery since 1924, and the other specially loaned by the Washington museum, which surround The Lullabya painting depicting a woman sitting on an armchair.
“By early 1889, he had already made five or six of his paintings (depicting sunflowers) in his studio, and he wondered how he wanted to show them (…). And he had this great idea“, underlines Christopher Riopelle, adding that the painter’s intention was to create a decor”which would be something comforting“, as he explained in one of his many letters to his brother Theo.
This is the first time that the works have been exhibited together in this way, strictly following Van Gogh’s project.
The exhibition “highlights how Van Gogh used themes“recurring in his work, like the peasant, the poet, or the Arlesienne, with the desire to imagine”archetypes“, explains Cornelia Homburg, co-curator. For the painter, “This was his chance to make his mark“, she adds, insisting that the exhibition focuses on “respect artistic ambition” the Van Gogh.
The nature and landscapes of the South of France are at the heart of the works and sources of multiple variations. This is demonstrated by a series on olive trees, another on the mountains around Saint-Rémy-de-Provence, or the gardens of a psychiatric institution in the same city, where Vincent van Gogh stayed for several months.
“He wasn’t just this tormented, suffering person. He was someone deeply attached to the beauty of nature, to his friends and family, and deeply attached to having a successful career as an avant-garde artist.“, insists Christopher Riopelle.
