“In the depths of his eyes, as if depilated, like a butcher, van Gogh indulged himself relentlessly in one of those operations of pure alchemy that took nature as an object and the human body as a pot or a crucible.” Now those eyes so alchemically described by the French writer and painter Antonin Artaud, in his essay “the suicide of society”, we will be able to scrutinize them while admiring the famous self-portrait exhibited in Rome in the great exhibition dedicated to the Dutch painter, who like few influenced Western painting of the twentieth century.
On the eve of the 170th anniversary of his birth, Palazzo Bonaparte in Piazza Venezia dedicates a large exhibition to the anniversary with 50 of the works of the prolific artist. In addition to the already mentioned and very famous Self-portrait of 1887, from tomorrow it will be possible to admire the Sower (1888), The hospital garden in Saint-Rémy and the Peiroulets Ravine (both of 1889), and the On the threshold of eternity (1890 ).
The exhibition, produced by Arthemisia and created in collaboration with the prestigious Kröller Müller Museum in Otterlo – which houses one of the greatest patrimonies of Van Gogh’s works in the world – is curated by Maria Teresa Benedetti and Francesca Villanti.
The exhibited works reconstruct the human and artistic story, both marked by torments and extreme sensitivity, punctuated by psychiatric hospitalizations, extreme gestures such as the famous one of the severed ear, up to the most extreme of all, suicide with a gunshot to the chest in Auvers camps at only 37 years old.
The exhibition in Rome – sponsored by the Lazio Region, the Department of Culture of the Municipality of Rome and the Embassy of the Kingdom of the Netherlands – reconstructs the flourishing artistic production of van Gogh, retracing the stages of his life from the Dutch period to his stay in Paris. from that in Arles to the periods at the psychiatric hospital of Saint-Rémy-de-Provence and Auvers-Sur-Oise where he ended his troubled life.
From the passionate relationship with the dark landscapes of youth to the sacred study of the work of the earth, figures arise who act in a severe everyday life such as the sower, the potato pickers, the weavers, the woodcutters, the women intent on domestic tasks or fatigued to transport bags of coal or digging the ground; attitudes of awkward sweetness, expressiveness of faces, fatigue understood as an ineluctable destiny. All of these are an expression of van Gogh’s greatness and intense relationship with the truth of the world.
Particular emphasis is given to the period of his stay in Paris in which van Gogh dedicated himself to an accurate search for color in the wake of the Impressionism and to a new freedom in the choice of subjects, with the conquest of a more immediate and chromatically vibrant language. His interest in human physiognomy is also strengthened, also decisive in the realization of a large series of self-portraits, the desire to leave a trace of himself and the conviction of having acquired in the technical experience a much greater fruitfulness than in the past.
The self-portrait on a blue background with green touches of 1887, present in the exhibition, is from this period, where the artist’s image stands out in three quarters, the penetrating gaze directed at the viewer shows an unusual pride, not always evident in the complex strings of van Gogh’s art.
The quick strokes of the brush, the strokes of color spread one next to the other give news of the ability to penetrate through the image a tumultuous idea of oneself, of a bewildering complexity.
The immersion in the light and heat of the south, starting from 1887, generates even greater openings towards chromatic excesses and the chromatism and strength of the stroke are reflected in the rendering of nature. Thus, the image of The Sower made in Arles in June 1888 returns, with which van Gogh warns that such an expressive sphere can only be reached through a metaphysical use of color.
And so The hospital garden in Saint-Rémy (1889) takes on the appearance of an intricate tumult, while the steepness of a Ravine (1889) seems to swallow all hope and the representation of a desperate Old Man (1890) becomes the image of a fatal despair.
Those in Rome between now and October 26th should not miss the opportunity to immerse themselves in the light and warmth of this unsurpassed artist.
For information and reservations, visit the websites www.mostrepalazzobonaparte.it and www.arthermisia.it