Self-Portrait as a Painter
Currently on view
Vincent van Gogh (1853 - 1890), Paris, September-November 1886
oil on canvas, 46.5 cm x 38.5 cm
Credits (obliged to state): Van Gogh Museum, Amsterdam (Vincent van Gogh Foundation)
This is one of the earliest self-portraits painted by Van Gogh – and the first in which he portrayed himself as an artist. He stands at his field easel, holding his palette. After more than five years of practice in the Netherlands and Antwerp (BE), he was eager to make his name as a painter in Paris.
The rectangular palette is covered with splotches of paint; each one is a pure, unmixed colour. At the top is a small jar of turpentine for thinning the paint. There are two holes in the palette: in one we see Van Gogh's thumb and in the other two brushes.
- F-number
- F0181
- JH-number
- JH1090
- Object number
- s0160V1962
- Dimensions
- 46.5 cm x 38.5 cm, 60.8 cm x 53.8 cm, 7.0 cm
- Provenance
- Left by the artist at the apartment of his brother Theo van Gogh, Paris, sometime between September and November 1886; 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, to the Vincent van Gogh Foundation, Amsterdam, 10 July 1962 (ratified 28 December 1970); 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)
Madrid, Museo Nacional del Prado, Reversos. Donde no Ilega la luz, 7 November 2023-3 March 2024
Amsterdam, Van Gogh Museum, In the Picture. Kunstenaarsportretten, 21 February-30 August 2020
Amsterdam, Van Gogh Museum, Van Gogh aan het werk, 1 May 2013-13 January 2014
Amsterdam, Hermitage Amsterdam, Vincent. Het Van Gogh Museum in de Hermitage Amsterdam, 29 September 2012-25 April 2013
Amsterdam, Van Gogh Museum, Van Gogh in Antwerpen en Parijs: nieuwe inzichten, 22 June-18 September 2011
Amsterdam, Van Gogh Museum, Van Gogh en Gauguin. Het atelier van het zuiden, 9 February-2 June 2002, no. 8
Chicago, Art Institute of Chicago, Van Gogh and Gauguin. The Studio of the South, 22 September 2001-13 January 2002, no. 8
Boston, Museum of Fine Arts (Boston), Van Gogh. Face to Face, 2 July-24 September 2000
Enschede, Rijksmuseum Twenthe, De groote expressie. Schilderijen van Van Gogh, Bernard, Israels, Puvis de Chavannes, Van Rappard, Sluijters en Von Stuck uit het Van Gogh Museum, 19 September 1998-11 April 1999
Hamburg, Hamburger Kunsthalle, Van Gogh. Die Pariser Selbstbildnisse, 17 March-28 May 1995, no. zonder nr.
Amsterdam, Van Gogh Museum, Parijse zelfportretten van Vincent van Gogh, 10 June-9 October 1994
London, Marlborough Fine Art, Van Gogh Selfportraits, October 1960, no. 1
Snell, Sylvia, Vincent van Gogh : the self-portraits : what do they tell us about the man and the artist?, 2014, p. 53-56
