A “new” Van Gogh painting has been discovered in Amsterdam and will be part of an upcoming show at the Van Gogh Museum there later this month.
Experts say they feel confident in attributing the work–titled “Sunset At Montmajour“–to the Dutch artist after studying the style, technique, paint, canvas, depiction, and Van Gogh’s letters. They also say the work’s provenance assures them that it’s the real thing.
“A discovery of this magnitude has never before occurred in the history of the Van Gogh Museum,” the museum’s director, Axel Ruger, said in a statement. “This is a great painting from what many see as the high point of his artistic achievement, his period in Arles, in southern France. In the same period he painted works such as ‘Sunflowers,’ ‘The Yellow House’ and ‘The Bedroom’.”
The painting depicts a dry landscape with yellow tints and was actually described by the artist in a letter to his brother, Theo, which is how experts dated the work; Van Gogh wrote that he’d just completed the painting the previous day, which would put its creation date at July 4, 1888. It was sold to a family in 1901 but gathered dust in an attic for years after they were told it wasn’t by the famous Dutch master at all. It’s the first full-sized work of his to be discovered since 1928.
Van Gogh was just beginning to gain recognition for his work when he died from a self-inflicted gunshot wound in 1890. He sold just one painting while he was alive.
Image: Wikimedia Commons