The Potato Eaters
Currently on view
Vincent van Gogh (1853 - 1890), Nuenen, April-May 1885
oil on canvas, 82 cm x 114 cm
Credits (obliged to state): Van Gogh Museum, Amsterdam (Vincent van Gogh Foundation)
Van Gogh saw the Potato Eaters as a showpiece, for which he deliberately chose a difficult composition to prove he was on his way to becoming a good figure painter. The painting had to depict the harsh reality of country life, so he gave the peasants coarse faces and bony, working hands. He wanted to show in this way that they ‘have tilled the earth themselves with these hands they are putting in the dish ... that they have thus honestly earned their food’.
He painted the five figures in earth colours – ‘something like the colour of a really dusty potato, unpeeled of course’. The message of the painting was more important to Van Gogh than correct anatomy or technical perfection. He was very pleased with the result: yet his painting drew considerable criticism because its colours were so dark and the figures full of mistakes. Nowadays, the Potato Eaters is one of Van Gogh’s most famous works.
- F-number
- F0082
- JH-number
- JH0764
- Object number
- s0005V1962
- Dimensions
- 82 cm x 114 cm, 100 cm x 133 cm
- Provenance
- Sent by the artist to his brother Theo van Gogh, Paris, at the beginning of May 1885; after his death on 25 January 1891, inherited by his widow, Jo van Gogh-Bonger, and their son, Vincent Willem van Gogh, Paris; administered until her death on 2 September 1925 by Jo van Gogh-Bonger, Bussum/Amsterdam/Laren; transferred by Vincent Willem van Gogh, Laren, to the Vincent van Gogh Foundation, Amsterdam, 10 July 1962; agreement concluded between the Vincent van Gogh Foundation and the State of the Netherlands, in which the preservation and management of the collection, and its placing in the Rijksmuseum Vincent van Gogh, to be realized in Amsterdam, is entrusted to the State, 21 July 1962; given on loan until the opening of the museum on 2 June 1973 to the Stedelijk Museum, Amsterdam; on permanent loan to the Rijksmuseum Vincent van Gogh from 2 June 1973 and at the Van Gogh Museum, Amsterdam, since 1 July 1994.
- artist
- Vincent van Gogh
- Credits (obliged to state)
- Van Gogh Museum, Amsterdam (Vincent van Gogh Foundation)
Amsterdam, Van Gogh Museum, De Aardappeleters: misser of meesterwerk?, 8 October 2021-13 February 2022
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Overbruggen, Peter van, 'Aardappeleters' geïnspireerd door een schilderij uit Eindhoven?, p. 59-62
