Two Van Gogh fakes in Washington?

Adventures with Van Gogh is a weekly blog by Martin Bailey, our long-standing correspondent and expert on the artist. Published every Friday, his stories will range from newsy items about this most intriguing artist to scholarly pieces based on his own meticulous investigations and discoveries.

Two Van Gogh fakes in Washington? Strong evidence produced against early drawings at the National Gallery of Art

Revelations in new book about an attic discovery throw fresh light on Vincent’s decision to become an artist

a blog by Martin Bailey

                   Vincent van Gogh (here attributed), The Zandmennik House           Courtesy of the National Gallery of Art, Washington, DC (Armand Hammer Collection)                    

Two sketches which have been regarded as the first surviving ones done after Vincent van Gogh’s decision to become an artist are “probably” fakes, according to Yves Vasseur, the author of a  forthcoming book. He believes they have been misattributed. The drawings of houses were discovered in 1958 in an attic in Cuesmes, in the Belgian Borinage, where Van Gogh served as a preacher among the miners. They were sold at auction and later donated to the National Gallery of Art in Washington, DC.

Courtesy of the National Gallery of Art, Washington, DC (Armand Hammer Collection)

Vasseur’s book, Vincent van Gogh: Matters of Identity, is to be published by Yale University Press next January. Serving as the head of Mons Cultural Capital of Europe 2015, Vasseur was the driving force behind the city’s exhibition Van Gogh in the Borinage: the Birth of an Artist. He has a track record for Van Gogh discoveries, having recently shown that one of the two accepted photographs of Vincent actually depicts his younger brother Theo.

In the 2015 Belgian exhibition, the two drawings on loan from Washington played a key role, opening a display focussing on Van Gogh’s decision to become an artist. In September 1880, Vincent—then aged 27—had written to Theo: “I’ll pick up my pencil… I’ll get back to  drawing, and from then on, it seems to me, everything has changed for me, and now I’m on my way.”

Following the Mons exhibition, Vasseur set out to investigate the drawings, which he had seen for the first time (as opposed to in reproductions). They had been discovered in 1958 in a trunk in the attic of the Cuesmes home of Samuel Delsaut (1900-78), at 17 Rue du Peuple.

Delsaut apparently described himself in 1958 as the grandson of Charles Decrucq (1822-84), who had been Van Gogh’s landlord from July to October 1880. The two drawings depict modest  houses very close to that of the Decrucqs—the homes of the Zandmennik and Magros families. It was assumed that Van Gogh had given them to Decrucq, possibly in lieu of rent.

It was while living with Decrucq that Vincent made the most important decision of his life—“to pick up” his pencil. He was then living in abject poverty, sharing a little room with his landlord’s children: “It’s tiny as it is, and there are two beds, the children’s and mine.”

Delsaut’s heart “skipped a  beat” when he noticed that the two drawings he discovered in the attic were both initialed “VG”. He therefore contacted Theo’s son, Vincent Willem van Gogh, who authenticated and published the drawings. Vasseur’s investigations suggest that this was after only cursory study and largely based on the Decrucq provenance. They were later published in the 1970 de la Faille catalogue raisonné of Van Gogh’s work, but it remains unclear how thoroughly they were  examined and they were probably accepted on the basis of Vincent Willem’s pronouncement.

Delsaut and his son Carlo decided to sell the  sketches. After this length of time it is impossible to know what examination the two major auction houses undertook. Sotheby’s decided that they were not  authentic—but Christie’s proved willing to proceed. The drawings eventually sold for £4,200 each at Christie’s in 1970.

Read full article :

https://www.theartnewspaper.com/blog/two-van-gogh-fakes-in-washington-strong-evidence-on-early-drawings-at-the-national-gallery-of-art

With thanks to Martin Bailey