Van Gogh’s extraordinary The Prison Courtyard from 1890, for instance, is in a temple-like room of its own. Painted while the artist was in the psychiatric asylum of St-Rémy-de-Provence, the image is based off a drawing he found of prisoners in England’s notorious Newgate prison. The corollaries between Van Gogh’s self-imposed incarceration and the English prisoners is almost too obvious to mention, but the claustrophobia of the image, combined with Van Gogh’s signature kinetic brushstrokes, will be a marked contrast to the artist’s better-known sunny landscapes and Starry Night.
One Time Only
When the five-month exhibition is over, the artworks will return to their respective museums in Russia.
As arduous as the show was to assemble—“such a project looks impossible at the beginning,” Claverie says—it will be doubly so, once the exhibition closes, to ever see the collection as a whole again.
“This is an historic exhibition,” says Claverie. “Not just for the history of the art, but also for the public.”
This article was provided by Bloomberg News.