‘Fake’ no more

Source:Reuters Published: 2013-9-10 18:23:01

Alex Rueger, director of the Van Gogh Museum in Amsterdam, presents a painting by Vincent van Gogh, entitled <em>Sunset at Montmajour</em> and painted in 1888, on Monday in Amsterdam. Photo: CFP

Alex Rueger, director of the Van Gogh Museum in Amsterdam, presents a painting by Vincent van Gogh, entitled Sunset at Montmajour and painted in 1888, on Monday in Amsterdam. Photo: CFP


A French landscape painting stored in an attic and kept from public view for a century because it was considered a fake is the work of Dutch master Vincent van Gogh, a museum said on Monday citing new research.

Sunset at Montmajour, which shows twisted holly oaks and a distant ruin bathed in the light of the setting sun, was painted in 1888 when Van Gogh was living in Arles, in the south of France.

The work, owned by a private collector, will go on show at the Van Gogh Museum in Amsterdam later this month for a year.

Museum director Axel Rueger described the discovery of a new work by Van Gogh as "a once in a lifetime experience" at a news conference on Monday.

"What makes this even more exceptional is that this is a transition work in his oeuvre, and moreover, a large painting from a period that is considered by many to be the culmination of his artistic achievement, his period in Arles," Rueger said.

As recently as 1991 the Van Gogh Museum had concluded that the painting was not by the Dutch artist.

But thanks to new research, including analysis of the pigments in the paint used and their discoloration as well as letters from Van Gogh himself, the museum changed its view.

In a letter to his brother dated July 5, 1888, Vincent described the scene he'd painted the previous day, but expressed disappointment at the end result, writing, "I brought back a study of it too, but it was well below what I'd wished to do."

The work was later listed in one of Theo's catalogs, and then reappeared in 1970 in the estate of Norwegian Christian Nicolai Mustad.

He was advised later on that it was a fake or wrongly attributed, and banished it to the attic.

Reuters

Posted in: ARTS

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