It is the end of several decades of uncertainty. Experts confirmed this Monday the authenticity of a self-portrait of Vincent van Gogh where he displays a sad air. This painting is considered to be the only work painted by the Dutch artist while he suffered from psychosis.
On the painting, called Self Portrait (1889), the tormented artist represented three-quarters, his head tilted down, his eyes blank, an expression of sadness on his closed face, all in muted tones .
Painted during an asylum stay
The authenticity of this painting, property of the National Gallery in Oslo (Norway), has been confirmed by experts from the Van Gogh museum in Amsterdam, who have finally swept away the doubts that loomed over the attribution of the canvas since 1970 After a scientific X-ray analysis, the study of brushstrokes and references to the painting in letters from the painter to his brother Theo, the experts established that the canvas had been painted in late summer 1889. Van Gogh was then staying in a mental asylum in Saint-Rémy-de-Provence, in the south of France.
The canvas is painted in muted colors than other Van Goghs of the same period, and part of the painting seems unfinished. "It is a work of art which, for many reasons, was by him but which nevertheless presented certain aspects different from the other paintings", explains Louis van Tilborgh, principal researcher at the Van Gogh museum. "So we had to find an explanation for this, which was difficult, but I think we have resolved this and we are proud to have more or less returned his work," he continues.
A canvas that represents a "mentally ill person"
Experts now identify this painting as a companion canvas to two famous self-portraits held by the National Gallery of Art in Washington and the Musée d'Orsay in Paris, made a little later by a Van Gogh, treated for his psychosis.
Unlike these two paintings, the canvas in the Oslo museum "undeniably represents a mentally ill person", observes Louis Van Tilborgh. A year before making this self-portrait, Van Gogh had cut his ear after an argument with Paul Gauguin. This gesture marked the beginning of a period of back and forth in hospices and asylums.
The work is currently on display at the Van Gogh Museum in Amsterdam and will return to Norway when its new national museum opens in 2021.
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