Amsterdam's renowned Van Gogh Museum has a new exhibition which focuses on the artist's final 18 months before he shot himself in 1890, including the suspected gun he used to commit suicide.
Image: Vincent van Gogh Foundation
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Van Gogh: Images on the verge of insanity
Amsterdam's renowned Van Gogh Museum has a new exhibition which focuses on the artist's final 18 months before he shot himself in 1890, including the suspected gun he used for commiting suicide.
Image: Vincent van Gogh Foundation
Van Gogh's final months
The exhibition seeks to answer questions such as why Van Gogh cut off his ear, and the precise nature of his mental illness that made him commit suicide at the age of 37 in Auvers-sur-Oise near Paris. Here Van Gogh can be seen with a bandaged ear in Emile Schuffenecker's "Man with a Pipe" from 1892-1900, which is exhibited in the Van Gogh Museum in Amsterdam.
Image: Vincent van Gogh Foundation
Doctor's reports
A fascinating exhibition piece is a recently-discovered letter from Felix Rey to American writer Irving Stone. The doctor treated Van Gogh after he cut off his left ear while living in Arles. The letter includes drawings showing that Van Gogh cut off his entire left ear and not, as was long believed, just part of it. The letter can be seen in the Bancroft Library of the University of California.
Image: The Bancroft Library
Portrait of the doctor
Van Gogh's portrait of Rey is on display for the first time at the museum, as well as some previously unexhibited documents about his illness. The doctor's letter was recently found by amateur historian and author Bernadette Murphy, while researching her book on Van Gogh. The painting of Dr Félix Rey from January 1889 is normally on display in the State Pushkin Museum of Fine Arts in Moscow.
Image: The State Pushkin Museum of Fine Arts, Moscow
Mysterious illness?
The exhibition offers a range of diagnoses throughout the years for Van Gogh's mental illness. However, "an unambiguous and definitive answer to the question of his precise illness cannot be given," the museum stresses. Pictured is Vincent van Gogh's "The Garden of the Asylum," from November - December 1889, where Van Gogh had voluntarily admitted himself.
Image: Vincent van Gogh Foundation
Madness and creativity
The Van Gogh Museum is organizing a symposium on Van Gogh's illness, to coincide with the exhibition. It will mostly deal with the question whether there is a relationship between madness and creativity. Pictured here is Van Gogh's "Entrance to a Quarry" from July 1889, which is a part of the exhibition.
Image: Vincent van Gogh Foundation
Art as therapy
In the final 18 months of his life, Van Gogh was plagued by a sporadic and unpredictable illness. Each episode left the artist confused and unable to work for day or weeks. Between the attacks, he continued to paint and draw. His work seems to have been the best remedy in his struggle with his illness. Pictured is his "Wheatfield with a Reaper" from September 1889, part of the exhibition.
Image: Vincent van Gogh Foundation
Outstanding artist despite illness
The exhibition "On the Verge of Insanity" tries to show that Van Gogh's art "ought not to be viewed as a product of his illness, but arose in spite of his condition," the museum says about this unique exhibition. Pictured here is Van Gogh's final painting from July 1890, "Tree Roots," which is also part of the exhibition.
Image: Vincent van Gogh Foundation
Suicide with a revolver
One of the most interesting exhibition pieces is a revolver believed to have been the weapon Van Gogh used to shoot himself. The artist shot himself in the chest on July 27, 1890 but managed to stumble back to the inn before succumbing to his wound 30 hours later. At the time the suicide weapon was not found. Around 1960, a farmer discovered a rusty gun in the fields where Van Gogh shot himself.
Image: private collection
Suicide of a great artist
The limited firepower of the revolver offers a possible explanation for why a bullet fired at such close range glanced off a rib. The bullet was deflected downwards and was lodged too deep to be removed without danger, as a result of which Van Gogh died of his wound some 30 hours later. Pictured is the funeral card for the death of Vincent van Gogh from July 1890.
Image: Vincent van Gogh Foundation
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Original letters and exceptional documents are being exhibited along with works of art by Van Gogh to seek answers to his mental illness, why he cut off his ear and what ultimately led to his death.
The "ear incident" with which Van Gogh's illness manifested itself in December 1888, while he was living in the southern French town of Arles, is reconstructed in the exhibition through eyewitness testimony and letters.
An exceptional loan is the recently discovered letter from Félix Rey, the doctor who treated Van Gogh in the hospital. The letter contains drawings that show Van Gogh cut off his entire ear.
Also part of the exhibition are the police report and the petition organized by Van Gogh's neighbors in Arles in 1889 to have him committed.
The revolver found in a field in Auvers-sur-Oise where Van Gogh shot himself is also on show for the first time. That weapon is believed to be the one that he used to take his own life.
The exhibition "On the Verge of Insanity" shows that Van Gogh's art should not be viewed as a product of his illness, but that it arose in spite of his condition. Paintings, drawings and documents are used to inform visitors about the key moments in Van Gogh's medical history. They learn how the people around the painter responded to his illness, whether or not his mental condition influenced his work, and also about the various diagnoses suggested by doctors over the years.
The exhibition runs from July 15 until September 25, 2016, at the Van Gogh Museum in Amsterdam.
