Van Gogh and Japan / The prints that shaped the artist

 

The Samuel Courtauld Trust, The Courtauld Gallery, London

Van Gogh and Japan: the prints that shaped the artist

Alastair Sooke
11 June 2018

A new exhibition reveals how the artist borrowed techniques from Japanese prints and incorporated them into his portraits, writes Alastair Sooke.

In February 1888, Vincent van Gogh left Paris, where he had been living for a couple of years, and headed for the city of Arles in Provence, in southern France. Exhausted by his time in the metropolis, and eager to recover some self-composure, he was seeking a simpler life that, he hoped, would revitalise both himself and his art. He was also keen to establish a community of artists, and felt excited by the possibilities.

Van Gogh’s yellow / More than just a color

Wheatfield with a Reaper' (1889), by Van Gogh.MUSEO VAN GOGH, ÁMSTERDAM (FUNDACIÓN VINCENT VAN GOGH)

Van Gogh’s yellow: more than just a color

The artist’s museum in Amsterdam shows how that tone became a means of expressing emotions and ideas, from warmth to rebellion

ISABEL FERRER

Amsterdam - MAR 20, 2026 - 15:36 

Color is reflected light, and among all colors, few are as significant as yellow for Vincent van Gogh, who explored its possibilities during his stay in Arles, in the south of France (1888-1889). It was there that he painted the series of “Sunflowers,” five canvases depicting the flowers in a vase. For the artist, who had left behind the darkness of his early period in the Netherlands, the complexity of this hue moved him deeply and led him to associate it with the brilliance of the sun. What it meant to him and his colleagues, and how it served as a symbol of modernity and independence in the literature and fashion of the late 19th and early 20th centuries, are the questions that the exhibition “Yellow: Beyond Van Gogh’s Color,” at the Van Gogh Museum in Amsterdam, seeks to answer until May 17.

Vincent van Gogh / Self-Portraits

Vincent van Gogh by Henri de Toulouse-Lautrec 1887 pastel on cardboard 54 x 45 cm

SELF-PORTRAITS

by Vincent van Gogh

1888 Self Portrait Dedicated to Paul Gauguin oil on canvas 59.5 x 48.3 cm Arles, September 1888

1886 Self-Portrait with Cap black chalk 20 x 11 cm Paris, Spring 1886

1886 Self-Portrait with Dark Felt Hat oil on canvas 41.5 x 32.5 cm Paris, Spring 1886

1886 Self-Portrait with Dark Felt Hat at the Easel oil on canvas 46.5 x 38.5 cm Paris, Spring 1886

1886 Self-Portrait with Pipe oil on canvas 46 x 38 cm Paris, Spring 1886

1886 Self-Portrait with Pipe oil on canvas 27 x 19 cm Paris, Spring 1886

1886 Self-Portrait oil on canvas 39.5 x 29.5 cm Paris, Autumn 1886

1886-7 Self Portrait with a Grey Felt Hat oil on cardboard 42 x 34 cm Paris, Winter 1886-7

1887 Two Self-Portraits pencil, pen & ink on paper 31 x 24 cm Paris January-June 1887

1887 Self-Portrait with Pipe and Glass oil on canvas 61 x 50 cm Paris early 1887

1887 Self-Portrait pencil 19 x 21 cm Paris, January-July 1887

1887 Self-Portrait in Grey Felt Hat oil on pasteboard 19 x 14 cm Paris, March-April 1887

1887 Self-Portrait oil on paper 32 x 23 cm Paris, Spring 1887

1887 Self-Portrait oil on pasteboard 19 x 14 cm Spring-Summer 1887

1887 Self-Portrait oil on pasteboard 41 x 33 cm Paris, Spring-Summer 1887

1887 Self-Portrait oil on cardboard 42 x 33.7 cm Paris, Spring 1887

1887 Self-Portrait oil on canvas 41 x 33.5 cm Paris, Summer 1887

1887 Self-Portrait with Straw Hat and Pipe oil on canvas 41.5 x 31.5 cm Paris, Summer 1887

1887 Self-Portrait oil on canvas 42 x 34 cm Paris, Summer 1887

1887 Self-Portrait with Straw Hat oil on canvas 41 x 31 cm Paris, Summer 1887

1887 Self-Portrait oil on canvas 42.5 x 31.5 cm Paris, Summer 1887

1887 Self-Portrait oil on canvas 41 x 33 cm Paris, Summer 1887

1887 Self Portrait with Straw Hat oil on panel 35.5 x 26.7 cm Paris, Summer 1887

1887 Self-Portrait with Straw Hat oil on cardboard 40.5 x 32.5 cm Paris, Summer 1887

1887 Self-Portrait oil on canvas 47 x 35 cm Paris, Autumn 1887

1887 Self-Portrait with a Japanese Print oil on canvas 44 x 35 cm Paris, December 1887

1887-8 Self-Portrait oil on canvas 46.5 x 35.5 cm Paris, Winter 1887-8

1887-8 Self-Portrait with Grey Felt Hat oil on canvas 44 x 37.5 cm Paris, Winter 1887-8

1887-8 Self-Portrait with Straw Hat oil on canvas 40.6 x 31.8 cm Paris, Winter 1887-8

1887 Self-Portrait with Straw Hat oil on pasteboard 19 x 14 cm

1887-8 Self-Portrait oil on canvas 46 x 38 cm

1887-8 Self-Portrait with Felt Hat oil on canvas 44 x 37.5 cm

1888 Self Portrait as an Artist oil on canvas 65.5 x 50.5 cm Paris, early 1888

1888 Self-Portrait with Pipe and Straw Hat oil on canvas 42 x 30 cm Arles, August 1888

1888 Self-Portrait oil on canvas 46 x 39 cm Arles, November-December 1888

1889 Self Portrait with Bandaged Ear oil on canvas 60.5 x 50 cm Arles, January 1889

1889 Self-Portrait with Bandaged Ear oil on canvas 51 x 45 cm Arles, January 1889

1889 Self-Portrait oil on canvas 40 x 31 cm Saint-Rémy, September 1889

1889 Self-Portrait with Palette oil on canvas 57 x 43.5 cm Saint-Rémy, August 1889

1889 Self-Portrait oil on canvas 65 x 54 cm Saint-Rémy September 1889 © Musée d'Orsay, dist.RMN / Patrice Schmidt

1889 Self-Portrait oil on canvas 51 x 45 cm Saint-Rémy September 1889

Art, pain, suffering / The masterpieces of Vincent Van Gogh

 

"Farmhouse in Provence" artwork by Vincent van Gogh, painted in February 1888 in Arles, in the south of France

Art, pain, suffering: the masterpieces of Vincent Van Gogh

Delving into the intersection of the great artist's anguish and inspiration

25 JULY 2024, 

MERYEM CHAGRAOUI

Being in pain and delving into the process of making art is such a brutal way to make value of the process that we call expression. But what is art at the end of the day but just a soul throwing up its ache in multiple forms and colours?

Vincent’s Room / A visit to the last residence of Vincent Van Gogh in Auvers-sur-Oise

 

Vincent Van Gogh

Vincent’s Room

A visit to the last residence of Vincent Van Gogh in Auvers-sur-Oise

18 JULY 2019, 

HALL GARDNER

I stayed in Paris only three days, and the noise, etc., of Paris had such a bad effect on me that I thought it wise for my head’s sake to fly to the country...

(Letter from Vincent van Gogh to Paul Gauguin, Auvers-sur-Oise, c. 17 June 1890)

Van Gogh / Poets and lovers

 

Vincent van Gogh, The bedroom, 1889. Courtesy of The National Gallery

Van Gogh. Poets and lovers

14 Sep 2024 — 19 Jan 2025 at The National Gallery in London, United Kingdom

15 JANUARY 2025

Public tickets are now sold out. There are a limited number of Member tickets available for late and overnight opening hours. 

 

Van Gogh: Poets & Lovers review – blockbuster portrait of a thoughtful master

Exhibition on Screen’s latest gallery documentary offers a walkthrough of the National Gallery’s winter show, complete with extras