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Artist or Maker: Vincent van Gogh (1853-1890)
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Exhibited: The Hague, Gemeentemuseum,
Verzameling H. P. Bremmer
, March-April 1950, no. 39.
Paris, Institut Néerlandais,
Les Amis de Van Gogh
, November-December 1960, no. 79.
The Hague, Haags Historisch Museum,
Van Gogh en Den Haag
, 1990.
Vienna, Bank Austria Kunstforum,
Van Gogh und die Haager Schule
, 1996, no. 16.
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Notes: Property from a Private American Collection
Following his decision in 1880 to become an artist, Vincent van Gogh struggled with his apprenticeship to a profession for which he did not immediately appear to have any notable talent. Drawing was, during those early years, a significant tool. As Sjraar van Heugten has observed, van Gogh's individual natural gifts lay in his ability to depict nature. "Even in the early years of his career he was quite able to capture [landscape's] various aspects. From boyhood onward he had a particular bond with nature and was a great admirer of landscape painting" (in Vincent van Gogh: The Drawings, New York, 2005, p. 56).
The current drawing was completed around the same time as two watercolors which van Gogh sent to his brother Theo in a September 1882 letter. He wrote, "As you will remember, when you were here, you spoke about my someday trying to send you a little drawing of a 'salable' nature. However, you must excuse my not knowing exactly when a drawing is, and when it is not, that kind. I used to think I knew, but now perceive daily that I am mistaken. Well, I hope this little bench, though perhaps not yet salable, will show you that I am not averse to choosing subjects sometimes which are pleasant or attractive and, as such, will find buyers sooner than things of a more gloomy nature" [Letter: 230]. The watercolors he sent, one of four people on a bench (fig. 1), and one of a nearby wood, were signed, an indication that van Gogh considered them finished, and hoped that Theo might indeed sell them.
The Bench belongs to a small group of the 'pleasant or attractive' subjects that van Gogh spoke of choosing to render (Hulsker, nos. 194 - 199). These drawings and watercolors all focus on figures walking or resting on a bench in a similar Hague wood. The current drawing is the only example from the series in which an empty bench and trees replace the figures as the work's primary subjects. The presence of other people is suggested only by two small outlines in the upper right corner of the nearly horizon-less composition. Van Gogh's quick pencil confidently delineates the wonderfully knotted, gnarled and exposed roots of the two central trees. Although the monumental roots still anchor the trees to the earth, it seems evident that they will soon fall, and be cut into planks, possibly to build a bench similar to the adjacent one.
Largely self-taught, van Gogh learned from illustrations in art publications, from prints, from his voracious reading, and from his extraordinary visual memory. Earlier in 1882, the artist had designed a perspective frame modeled on a similar device he saw in an Albrecht Dürer print. He relied on the instrument to help in his study of 'good drawing' and perspective. Here, in his dramatic foreshortening of the bench, treatment of its receding perspectival lines, and in the echoes of the bench in the receding trunks of the falling trees, van Gogh demonstrated his attention to such lessons. Neither a wholly spontaneous observation of nature, nor an overly wrought composition, The Bench is among the rare, truly successful and original drawings from the artist's very early career in The Hague.
(fig. 1) Vincent van Gogh, Four people on a bench, September 1882. On permanent loan to the van Gogh Museum, Amsterdam. BARCODE 20625207
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