The Ravoux inn, located in Auvers-sur-Oise, had planned to exhibit in the room where the Dutch painter died in 1890 his canvas The Garden at Auvers. But faced with the ever-increasing demands of the brokers who currently manage the masterpiece, the approach did not succeed.
Last home of Vincent Van Gogh, the Ravoux inn located in Auvers-sur-Oise (Val-d’Oise), dreamed of hosting one of his paintings for the 170th anniversary of the birth of the Dutch painter.
Everything was ready for the occasion. The work The Garden in Auvers, which rarely leaves its safe, was to make a stop in the commune of Île-de-France, before flying to Amsterdam to the Van Gogh museum, and returning to the Orsay museum in Paris next October , as part of the exhibition Van Gogh in Auvers-sur-Oise.
But as related The Parisian this Thursday, it was without counting on the eternal demands of insurers and brokers, who temporarily manage the table since the recent death of its owner.
An exhibition canceled with “brutality”
While the painting was to land on February 27 in the room of the inn where Van Gogh died, its visit was canceled at the last minute. And this despite the precautions taken by Dominique Charles Janssens, owner of the Ravoux inn since 1987, which he has transformed into a museum.
“The brutality with which the exhibition was canceled is extremely detrimental to us and is difficult to digest”, relates to our colleagues from the Parisian this former Danone executive.
Especially since in view of the exhibition, armored doors were purchased, as well as surveillance cameras, for a total of more than 400,000 euros in expenditure.
Exhibiting one of his paintings in the last home of the painter was Dominique Charles Janssens’ dream. Already in 2021, in the columns of the echoeshe detailed his ultimate goal:
“Realizing the dream of Van Gogh who wrote to his brother Theo: ‘One day, I will find a way to put on an exhibition in a café'”.
A painting sold for 108 million dollars in 2022
Because although he is now almost unanimously recognized as one of the greatest artists of all time, Van Gogh lived in poverty and in relative anonymity. Only one of his paintings was sold during his lifetime, red vine, sold for 400 francs to Anne Boch, Belgian painter and patron.
Since his death, however, the dynamic has accelerated at lightning speed. Vincent Van Gogh’s work is today one of the best rated in the world. On November 10, 2022, his painting Orchard with cypresses sold for 108 million euros at auction, a record for the artist.
A value that may explain the reluctance of insurers and brokers to exhibit the painting in the Ravoux inn, despite the precautions taken by its owner.
Such an approach, however, would have made sense artistically. It was in Auvers-sur-Oise that Vincent Van Gogh spent the last 70 days of his life, from May 20 to July 29, 1890, and it is also there that he is buried alongside his brother Theo.
In this commune, at the height of his artistic mastery, he overflowed with creativity and devoted himself to depicting peasant life, the fields or even the communal church. He will paint during this period more than 70 paintings, before dying as a result of a bullet wound he allegedly inflicted on his chest.
A tumultuous history of painting
After this failure, Dominique Charles Janssens told the Parisian that he is of “optimistic nature”, and that he will continue to try to realize his dream, now that his inn is “completely ready to welcome a painting”.
This sequence is in any case added to the already tumultuous history of the painting The garden at Auvers. Purchased for around 160,000 euros in 1955 by the collector Jacques Walter, the work had been classified by the French Ministry of Culture, in order to prevent the canvas from leaving French territory, as an article in the Monde. In 1996, justice condemned the State to pay 23.03 million euros to the collector in compensation.
In 1992, the canvas was then sold for 9.41 million euros to banker Jean-Marc Vernes. But when the latter died, doubts had emerged in the press about the authenticity of the canvas. It was not until June 25, 1999 that the laboratory of the Museums of France had definitively attributed the canvas to Van Gogh’s hand.