a bumper yr of exhibitions, openings, books and an Amsterdam celebration

The Van Gogh Museum in Amsterdam will mark the fiftieth anniversary of its opening in 1973 with a sequence of main exhibitions celebrating the artist. Established with the gathering inherited by Vincent’s brother Theo, it’s by far the world’s hottest museum dedicated to a single painter.

This represents a spectacular achievement for an artist who’s famend for under promoting a single portray throughout his lifetime. The museum usually welcomes round 2 million guests a yr, though final yr the determine was simply 1.3 million due to the lingering influence of Covid-19.

Normally the museum dedicates one or two exhibitions a yr to Van Gogh’s work, with the rest on different artists, primarily from the late nineteenth century. However in 2023 Vincent himself can be celebrated with three main exhibits, which can probably assist win again the crowds.

The yr will kick off with Selecting Vincent: Portrait of a Household Historical past (10 February-10 April). Billed as a narrative of “doubt, setbacks, pleasure and triumph”, the exhibition units out to look at how Theo, his spouse Jo Bonger and their son, additionally named Vincent, helped the painter win international recognition—together with by way of the founding of the Amsterdam museum.

Essentially the most bold exhibition will take a look at the artist’s time in Auvers-sur-Oise, the village simply north of Paris the place he spent the final months of his life. Van Gogh in Auvers-sur-Oise: His Remaining Months opens in Amsterdam (12 Could-3 September) after which travels to the Musée d’Orsay in Paris (3 October-28 January 2024). It’s going to embody simply over half the 74 work that he accomplished within the 70 days earlier than his suicide in July 1890.

The opposite main two-venue exhibition can be Van Gogh and the Avant-Garde: The Trendy Panorama, which focuses on how Vincent and his contemporaries painted by the River Seine on the outskirts of Paris. This present must be a revelation, following detailed analysis on these riverscapes. It’s going to first be offered on the Artwork Institute of Chicago (14 Could-4 September) after which on the Van Gogh Museum (13 October-14 January 2024).

Individuals may also have a novel alternative to find the work of cypresses, a motif that the artist found within the south of France. Van Gogh’s Cypresses, additionally primarily based on recent analysis, is developing at New York’s Metropolitan Museum of Artwork (22 Could-27 August).

Again within the Netherlands, the primary exhibition ever on Van Gogh’s keep within the far north of the nation can be mounted on the Drents Museum within the provincial capital of Assen. Van Gogh in Drenthe (11 September-7 January 2024) is anticipated to reassemble all 5 surviving work and many of the drawings and paperwork that date from the artist’s interval on this distant space throughout the autumn of 1883, 140 years in the past.

Guests might mix the Drenthe exhibition with a visit to close by Hoogeveen and Nieuw-Amsterdam, the villages the place Van Gogh painted. In Nieuw-Amsterdam he lodged at a small inn, which now hosts the Van Gogh Home. Not too long ago closed for renovations, it is because of reopen on 17 June.

In Nuenen, in Brabant province within the very south of the Netherlands, Vincent spent practically two years residing in his mother and father’ home at a vital time when he critically got down to turn out to be a painter, in 1883-85. An present customer centre there’s being expanded to create the Van Gogh Village Museum, scheduled to open on 16 Could. The museum stands instantly throughout the street from the parsonage the place Vincent’s father served as rector.

Crucial new Van Gogh e book of the yr might be the Atlas Van Gogh in Brabant, describing the villages the place Vincent was introduced up and later labored—primarily Zundert, Helvoirt, Etten and Nuenen. Written by Brabant specialists Ron Dirven and Helewise Berger, it will likely be printed in Dutch by W Books on 30 March, the a hundred and seventieth anniversary of the artist’s delivery. An English version must also be on the best way, hopefully later this yr.

One other publication popping out in March is Vincent’s Arles: As It Is and as It Was, with the College of Chicago Press. Creator Linda Seidel acts as a information to the locations immortalised by Van Gogh on this Provençal metropolis.

And to rejoice Vincent’s legacy, everyone seems to be invited to Amsterdam’s Museumplein (Museum Sq.). Simply to the south of the town centre, it borders the Van Gogh Museum, the Rijksmuseum and Stedelijk Museum. On 2 June the grassy sq. will host a celebration marking the fiftieth anniversary of the Van Gogh Museum.