Ambitious exhibitions of Vincent’s work are planned for next year, including three at the Van Gogh Museum in Amsterdam. The museum opened in June 1973, so it promises to mark the 50th anniversary year with a flourish. Its two major shows are being organised in conjunction with the Art Institute of Chicago and the Musée d’Orsay in Paris.
What is particularly exciting about the 2023 global exhibition programme is that the shows will break new ground, rather than simply offering Van Gogh’s greatest hits. We run through the 2023 treats in store.
Vienna, February
Van Gogh’s The Plain of Auvers (June 1890). © Belvedere, Vienna (photograph Johannes Stoll)
Klimt: Inspired by Van Gogh, Rodin, Matisse is about to open at Amsterdam’s Van Gogh Museum (7 October-8 January 2023)—and next year it will go on to Vienna, to the Belvedere (3 February-29 May 2023). Based on fresh research, it sets out to examine the impact of slightly earlier avant-garde masters on Gustav Klimt. These include Van Gogh, who will be represented at the Belvedere by five oil paintings, along with 15 Klimts (plus works on paper and paintings by other artists). The show is curated by Markus Fellinger (Belvedere), Edwin Becker and Renske Suijver (both from the Van Gogh Museum).
Amsterdam, February
Van Gogh’s Almond Blossom (February 1890) © Van Gogh Museum, Amsterdam (Vincent van Gogh Foundation)
Choosing Vincent: From Family Inheritance to World-Famous Collection (10 February-10 April 2023) tells what the Van Gogh Museum calls “a personal story of doubt, setbacks, pride, and triumph”. Vincent failed dismally to sell his work, so most of his paintings were bequeathed to his brother Theo. Tragically, Theo died six months later, and the task of caring for the collection then passed to his widow Jo Bonger and their son, also named Vincent. It was the artist’s nephew Vincent who helped establish the Van Gogh Museum. Centred around paintings in the museum’s collection, the show is curated by Lisa Smit.
Alkmaar (Netherlands), April
Van Gogh’s Path in the Woods (May-July 1887)
© Van Gogh Museum, Amsterdam (Vincent van Gogh Foundation)
Van Gogh, Cezanne, Le Fauconnier & the Bergen School (29 April-3 September 2023) focuses on the painters who worked in the artists' colony in the Dutch village of Bergen in around 1914. The show looks at the influence of Van Gogh, Cezanne and the French Cubist Henri Le Fauconnier on the Bergen painters. To be presented at the Stedelijk Museum in Alkmaar, which is just north of Amsterdam, it will include six Van Gogh paintings lent by other Dutch museums. The lead curator is Alkmaar’s Marjan van Heteren.
Amsterdam, May and Paris, September
Van Gogh's Wheatfield with Crows (July 1890). © Van Gogh Museum
Van Gogh in Auvers-sur-Oise: His Final Months will first be presented at the Van Gogh Museum (12 May-3 September 2023) and then at the Musée d’Orsay in Paris (3 October 2023-28 January 2024). The artist came to Auvers, a village just north of Paris, arriving from the asylum in Provence. During his 70 days, he completed 70 paintings, an astonishing achievement. Tragedy then struck. Vincent shot himself while in the wheatfields—it was certainly suicide, not murder. The exhibition will also explore his rise to fame. With around 50 Van Gogh paintings, it is curated by Nienke Bakker (Van Gogh Museum) and Emmanuel Coquery (Musée d’Orsay).
Chicago, May and Amsterdam, October
Van Gogh’s Fishing in Spring, the Pont de Clichy (Asnières) (spring 1887)
© Alert Institute of Chicago
Van Gogh and the Avant-Garde: Along the Seine will open at the Art Institute of Chicago (14 May–4 September 2023) and then go to the Van Gogh Museum (13 October 2023-14 January 2024). It examines the impact of the Post-Impressionist artists who flocked in the 1880s to Asnières, in the northern suburbs of Paris, on the River Seine. Along with Van Gogh, they included Georges Seurat, Paul Signac and Emile Bernard, who experimented with colour and the application of paint. With around 20 Van Gogh paintings, the show is curated by Jacquelyn Coutré (Art Institute of Chicago) and Bregje Gerritse (Van Gogh Museum).
Assen (Netherlands), September
Van Gogh’s Head of a Woman (October 1883)
© Kröller-Müller Museum, Otterlo
Van Gogh in Drenthe at the Drents Museum, Assen (11 September 2023-7 January 2024) will be the first exhibition devoted to what has been the most neglected period of Van Gogh’s career, the two months in the autumn of 1883 which he spent in the remote province of Drenthe, in the north of the Netherlands. The hard life in the peat bogs made him even more steadfast in his goal: to become a painter of peasants. Van Gogh found work difficult, and only five oil paintings and 17 drawings and watercolours from Drenthe survive. The Drents Museum curator, Annemiek Rens, set out to borrow all these works—although a few are not available, most will be coming. A visit to the museum, in the provincial capital of Assen, will also offer an opportunity to explore the nearby sites where Van Gogh worked.
For this current year, Van Gogh in America, at the Detroit of Institute of Arts, will open on 2 October and run until 22 January 2023. This major show will examine how the artist eventually achieved fame in the US.
A newly announced exhibition in Rome will also run into next year. Van Gogh: Masterpieces from the Kröller-Müller Museum will be at the Palazzo Bonaparte (8 October-26 March 2023). There will be 50 paintings and works on paper coming from the museum in Otterlo.
And looking further ahead beyond next year, London’s National Gallery will be holding a Van Gogh extravaganza in 2024-25, focussing on his greatest period, in Provence: Van Gogh: Poets and Lovers.
Other Van Gogh news:
The surviving tree roots at 46 Rue Daubigny, Auvers-sur-Oise and (below) Van Gogh’s Tree Roots (July 1890)
© Vangoghroots, Auvers-sur-Oise and Van Gogh Museum, Amsterdam (Vincent van Gogh Foundation)
The newly discovered place where Van Gogh painted Tree Roots (July 1890), his last picture in Auvers-sur-Oise, is to be opened up to visitors on small tours conducted by the landowner, Jean-François Serlinger. The site in Rue Daubigny was discovered two years ago by Van Gogh specialist Wouter van der Veen, casting a fresh light on the artist’s final day. Bookable tours on this private land have just been announced, for 25-30 September and 18-22 October.
