Van Gogh museum unveils new willow watercolor
Source: Agencies |
May 11, 2012, Friday
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Print Edition
Print Edition
A YOUNG Vincent van Gogh was so struck by a dead willow leaning "lonely and melancholy" over a pond near The Hague that he knew at once he had to paint it.
"I'm going to attack it tomorrow morning," he wrote to his brother Theo on July 26, 1882.
The Van Gogh Museum unveiled the painting yesterday, the first addition in five years to its world-famous collection of works by the postimpressionist master.
At a time when the artist was still honing his skills in perspective, anatomy and proportion using pen and pencil sketches, the watercolor was a bolt from the blue, although its muted tones are still a far cry from the exuberant and colorful oil paintings that characterized his later works. "It's a very elaborate, well done watercolor and that's quite extraordinary in this period of van Gogh's oeuvre," said Marije Vellekoop, the museum's curator of prints and drawings.
The willow trunk droops over the water and a path wends its way to the horizon, where a windmill stands near a railroad depot.
The Amsterdam museum director Axel Rueger said the painting, bought at auction in London earlier this year for US$1.9 million, filled a gap in the museum's collection of van Gogh works.
"I'm going to attack it tomorrow morning," he wrote to his brother Theo on July 26, 1882.
The Van Gogh Museum unveiled the painting yesterday, the first addition in five years to its world-famous collection of works by the postimpressionist master.
At a time when the artist was still honing his skills in perspective, anatomy and proportion using pen and pencil sketches, the watercolor was a bolt from the blue, although its muted tones are still a far cry from the exuberant and colorful oil paintings that characterized his later works. "It's a very elaborate, well done watercolor and that's quite extraordinary in this period of van Gogh's oeuvre," said Marije Vellekoop, the museum's curator of prints and drawings.
The willow trunk droops over the water and a path wends its way to the horizon, where a windmill stands near a railroad depot.
The Amsterdam museum director Axel Rueger said the painting, bought at auction in London earlier this year for US$1.9 million, filled a gap in the museum's collection of van Gogh works.
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