Van Gogh Museum

Frommer's Review

More than 200 paintings by Vincent van Gogh (1853-90), along with nearly every sketch, print, etching, and piece of correspondence the artist ever produced have been housed here since the museum opened in 1973. Van Gogh's sister-in-law and a namesake nephew presented the collection to Holland with the provision that the canvases not leave Vincent's native land. To the further consternation of van Gogh admirers and scholars elsewhere in the world, all but a few of the artist's works that aren't in this museum hang at the Kröller-Müller Museum in the Hoge Veluwe National Park near Arnhem.

You can trace this great artist's artistic and psychological development -- or decline -- by viewing the paintings displayed in chronological order according to the seven distinct periods and places of residence that defined his short career. (He painted for only 10 years and was on the threshold of success when he committed suicide at age 37). Only one of van Gogh's paintings sold during his lifetime (Theo sold it), but he did give others out to pay for food, drink, and lodgings -- some perhaps went for little more than a song.

The Potato Eaters (1885) was van Gogh's anxious and sensitive first masterpiece. Dark and crudely painted, it depicts a group of Dutch peasants gathered around the table for their evening meal after a long day of manual labor, impressing upon the viewer a sense of the hard, rough conditions of their lives. Gone are the beauty and serenity of traditional Dutch genre painting.

After his father died, van Gogh traveled first to Antwerp and then to Paris to join Theo. In Paris, he discovered and adopted the impressionists' brilliant color palette. Theo, an art dealer, introduced him to Gauguin, and the two artists often conversed about the expressive power of pure color. Van Gogh developed a thick, highly textured brushwork style to complement his intense color schemes.

In 1888, van Gogh traveled to Arles in Provence. He was dazzled by the Mediterranean sun, and his favorite color, yellow (it signified love to him), dominated such landscapes as Wheatfield with a Reaper (1889). Until his death 2 years later, van Gogh remained in the south of France painting at a frenetic pace, between bouts of madness. In The Night Café (1888), a billiard hall's red walls and green ceiling combine with a sickly yellow lamplight to charge the scene with an oppressive, almost nightmarish air. (With red and green, Vincent wrote, he tried to represent "those terrible things, men's passions.") We see the halos around the lights swirl as if we, like some of the patrons slumped over their tables, have had too much to drink.

One particularly splendid wall on the second floor has 18 paintings produced during that 2-year period in the south of France, generally considered to be his artistic high point. It's a symphony of colors and contrasts that includes Gauguin's Chair, The Yellow House, Self-Portrait with Pipe and Straw Hat, Vincent's Bedroom at Arles, Wheatfield with Reaper, Bugler of the Zouave Regiment, and the very famous Still Life Vase with Fourteen Sunflowers, best known simply as Sunflowers. By the time you reach the vaguely threatening painting of black crows rising from a waving cornfield, you can almost feel the mounting inner pain the artist was finally unable to bear.

Works by some of van Gogh's friends and contemporaries, including Toulouse-Lautrec, Gauguin, and Monet, bolster this collection.

A new wing, elliptical and partly underground, designed by Japanese architect Kisho Kurokawa, opened on Museumplein in June 1999 to temporarily house works by van Gogh and other artists.

Note: Lines at the museum can be very long, especially in summer -- try going on a weekday morning. Once inside, allow 2 to 4 hours to see everything. Audio tours with mobile-phone-type units are available.

Note: This information was accurate when it was published, but can change without notice. Please be sure to confirm all rates and details directly with the companies in question before planning your trip.

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