Painting of bedroom, blue walls, green window, tan bed, red bedding.

The Bedroom

1889

Vincent van Gogh (Dutch, 1853–1890)

Artist
Vincent van Gogh
Origin
Saint-Rémy-de-Provence
Medium
Oil on canvas
Dimensions
73.6 × 92.3 cm (29 × 36 5/8 in.); Framed: 88.9 × 108 × 8.9 cm (35 × 42 1/2 × 3 1/2 in.)
Credit Line
Helen Birch Bartlett Memorial Collection
Reference Number #
1926.417
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  • Forbes Watson, "A Note on the Birch Bartlett Collection," The Arts 9, no. 6 (June 1926): 303–06 (ill.), 307–13.
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  • Vincent van Gogh, Further Letters to His Brother, 1886–1889 (London: Constable and Co., 1929), 234–35, 280, 371–72.
  • Art Institute of Chicago, A Guide to the Paintings in the Permanent Collection (Chicago: Art Institute of Chicago, 1932), 27 (ill.).
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  • W. Scherjon and Jos. de Gruyter, Vincent van Gogh's Great Period: Arles, St. Rémy and Auvers sur Oise (Complete Catalog) (Amsterdam: De Spieghel, 1937), 140 (ill.), no. 12.
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  • Charles Fabens Kelley, “Chicago: record years,” Art News 51, no. 4 (June–August 1952): 52–65, 106–08, 109 (ill.), 110–11.
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  • Peter C. Sutton, A Guide to Dutch Art in America (Washington, D.C.: Netherlands-American Amity Trust; Grand Rapids: Eerdmans, 1986), 54 fig. 77.
  • Richard R. Brettell, “The Bartletts and the ‘Grande Jatte’: Collecting Modern Painting in the 1920s,” Art Institute of Chicago Museum Studies 12, no. 2 (1986): 105, 111.
  • Richard R. Brettell, “Van Gogh’s Bedroom at Arles: the Problem of Priority,” Art Institute of Chicago Museum Studies 12, 2 (1986): pp. 136–37 (ill.), 138–51.
  • James N. Wood and Katharine C. Lee, eds., Master Paintings in The Art Institute of Chicago (Chicago Art Institute of Chicago, 1988), 65 (ill.).
  • Walter Feilchendeldt, Vincent van Gogh and Paul Cassirer, Berlin: the reception of Van Gogh in Germany from 1901 to 1914 (Zwolle: Van Gogh Museum, 1988), 98 (ill.).
  • Jan Hulsker, “Bedroom Problems,” Simiolus, 18, 4 (1988): 257–59 (ill.), 260–61.
  • Ingo F. Walther and Rainer Metzger, Vincent Van Gogh Sämtliche Gemälde (Cologne: Benedikt Taschen Verlag, 1989), 441, 442, 548, 549 (color ill.).
  • Gene A. Mittler, Art in Focus (New York: Glencoe Publishing Company, 1989), p. 319, fig. 17.6.
  • Richard Thomson, “State of the Art Van Gogh,” Apollo 132, no. 341(July 1990): 41 fig. 14, 42.
  • “Vincent van Gogh Retrospective Exhibition,” Van Gogh Bulletin 5, no. 1 (1990): 5 (color ill.), 6.
  • Jan Hulsker, The New Complete Van Gogh, Enlarged Edition of the Catalogue Raisonné of the Works of Vincent van Gogh (Aldershot, England; Burlington, VT: J.M. Meulenhoff; Philadelphia: John Benjamins Pub. Co., 1996), 404-09 no. 1771, 496n1771.
  • Mark Rosenthal, The Robert and Jane Meyerhoff Collection, 1945 to 1995, exh. cat. (Washington, D.C., National Gallery of Art, 1996), 123–29 fig. 11.
  • Sculpture Foundation, Solid Impressions: J. Seward Johnson, Jr. (Hamilton, NJ: The Sculpture Foundation, 2002), 26 (color ill.), 27–29.
  • Petra ten-Doesschate Chu, "The Reality of Illusion, The Illusion of Reality," in Beyond the Frame: Impressionism Revisited: The Sculptures of J. Seward Johnson, Jr., exh. cat. (Boston: Bulfinch Press; Washington, D.C.: In association with the Corcoran Gallery of Art, 2003), 11 (color ill.), 12, 15–18.
  • Richard R. Brettell, "A View from Portland: 110 Years of Modern French Art in Portland," in Paris to Portland: Impressionist and Post Impressionist Masters in Portland Collections, exh. cat. (Portland: Portland Art Museum, 2003), p. 33, fig. 3.
  • Kimberly A. Smith, Between Ruin and Renewal: Egon Schiele's Landscapes (New Haven: Yale University Press, 2004), 30 fig. 15, 31.
  • Katharine Kuh, My Love Affair with Modern Art: Behind the Scenes with a Legendary Curator (New York: Arcade Publishing, 2006), 52–53 (ill.), 91–94.
  • Jill Lloyd, Vincent van Gogh and Expressionism, exh. cat. (Ostfildern: Hatje Cantz Verlag; Amsterdam: Van Gogh Museum, 2006), 115–16, 122 (color ill.), 123–24.
  • Tsukasa Kodera, Vincent Willem van Gogh (Tokyo: Shogakukan, 2006), 16 (color ill.).
  • Leo Jansen, Hans Luijten, and Nienke Bakker, eds., Vincent van Gogh, The Letters: The Complete Illustrated and Annotated Edition, vol 5: Saint-Rémy-de-Provence - Auvers-sur-Oise, 1889–1890 (Amsterdam: Van Gogh Museum; The Hague: Huygens Institute; Brussels: Mercatorfonds, 2009), 79 fig. 2, 80–88.
  • Marika Spring, Helen Howard, Jo Kirby, Joseph Padfield, David Peggie, Ashok Roy, and Anne Stephenson-Wright, Studying Old Master Paintings: Technology and Practice (London: Archetype Publications: In association with the National Gallery, 2011), 237–38 fig. 2, 239–43.
  • Walter Feilchenfeldt, Vincent van Gogh: Die Gemälde 1886–1890 Händler, Sammler, Ausstellungen Die Frühen Provenienzen (Wädenswil, Switzerland: Nimbus, Kunst und Bücher, 2009), 118 (color ill.).
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  • Gloria Groom, ed., Van Gogh's Bedrooms, exh. cat. (New Haven and London: Art Institute of Chicago, Yale University Press, 2016), 8, 24, 26, 34, 51, 53–54, 61–65, 69, 71–73, 76–88, 90–97, 99n5, 100n19, 101n27, 101n37, 102n70, 103n85, 103n88, 103n91, 137, pl. 21.
  • Jill Shaw, ed., Van Gogh in America, exh. cat. (Detroit: Detroit Institute of Arts; New Haven: Yale University Press, 2022), 82, 128, 130, 131 pl. 45, 148, 163, 165n3, 209-10, 218, 222, 228n80, 228 n139, 228n141, 238 cat. 53.
  • Michael Lobel, Van Gogh and the End of Nature (New Haven and London: Yale University Press, 2024), 110 fig. 61, 111, 136-37 (detail ill.),148-149 fig. 73.
  • Cornelia Homburg, Van Gogh: Poets & Loverbs, exh. cat. (London: National Gallery, 2024), 39, 131 fig. 95, 226.
  • Paris, Galerie Vollard, 1895, no cat.
  • Paris, Galerie Bernheim-Jeune, Vincent van Gogh, Mar. 15–31, 1901, cat. 19, as La Chambre de Vincent à Arles.
  • Vienna Secession, Internationalen Kunstschau, May–Oct. 1909, room 14, cat. 1, as Das Schlafzimmer.
  • Berlin, Paul Cassirer, Zehnte Ausstellung: Vincent van Gogh: 30 März 1853–29 Juli 1890, May–June 1914, cat. 53, as Das Schlafzimmer.
  • New York, Museum of Modern Art, First Loan Exhibition: Cézanne, Gauguin, Seurat, Van Gogh, Nov. 7–Dec. 7, 1929, cat. 79, as Van Gogh's Room at Arles (La Chambre à Arles).
  • Art Institute of Chicago, A Century of Progress, June 1–Nov. 1, 1933, cat. 376.
  • Art Institute of Chicago, A Century of Progress, June 1–Nov. 1, 1934, cat. 310.
  • Toledo Museum of Art, French Impressionists and Post Impressionists, Nov. 1934, cat. 24.
  • Art Institute of Chicago, Paintings and Drawings by Vincent van Gogh, lent through the Museum of Modern Art, N.Y., Aug. 26–Sep. 23, 1936, no cat.
  • Amsterdam, Van Gogh Museum, Vincent van Gogh Paintings, Mar. 30–July 29, 1990, cat. 7.
  • Essen, Museum Folkwang, Vincent van Gogh und die Moderne 1890–1914, Aug. 11–Nov. 4, 1990, cat. 40, as Das Schlafzimmer; Amsterdam, Van Gogh Museum, Nov. 16, 1990–Feb. 18, 1991.
  • Art Institute of Chicago, Van Gogh and Gauguin: The Studio of the South, Sep. 22, 2001–Jan. 13, 2002, cat. 120.
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  • Amsterdam, Van Gogh Museum, Van Gogh at Work, Sep. 1, 2013 - Jan. 13, 2014, cat. 266.
  • Art Institute of Chicago, Van Gogh’s Bedrooms, Feb. 14–May 10, 2016, no cat. no., plate 26.
  • Detroit Institute of Art, Van Gogh and America, Oct. 2, 2022 - Jan. 22, 2023, cat. 53.
  • London, National Gallery, Vincent van Gogh: Poets and Lovers, Sep. 14, 2024–Jan. 19, 2025, fig. 95.
Painting of a red-haired, bearded man with light skin, painted in short brushstrokes and multicolored dots. The background is likewise a mass of small, closely spaced colored dots, these in green, blue, and red-orange.

Self-Portrait

Vincent van Gogh

Oil on artist's board, mounted on cradled panel

1887

Lush tall grasses with small white flowers foreground a grove of bushy trees of varying types and heights, their leaves ranging from deep green to golden. Beneath a dense and heavy yellow sky, a small blue triangle suggesting a mountain peak crests above the treeline at far left.

The Poet's Garden

Vincent van Gogh

Oil on canvas

1888

Painting in tones of gray and brown, with some green and blue, of a woman digging with a garden tool before a structure with a thatched roof that descends almost to the ground. Above her the sky is gray and blue, a haze of clouds.

A Peasant Woman Digging in Front of Her Cottage

Vincent van Gogh

Oil on canvas

c. 1885

Painting of three male figures, two older men in top hats and a younger man with red hair, standing outdoors around a wooden table with a pitcher on it, drinking from glasses. A much smaller, childlike figure at left peers over the table and drinks from a white cup. The scene is rendered in winding paint strokes in shades of green and blue.

The Drinkers

Vincent van Gogh

Oil on canvas

1890

Painting in short strokes of pale blue, green, white, yellow, and pink, of a fisherman in one of two small boats on a river, a tree-lined bank and a bridge in the background.

Fishing in Spring, the Pont de Clichy (Asnières)

Vincent van Gogh

Oil on canvas

1887

A work made of oil on canvas.

Madame Roulin Rocking the Cradle (La berceuse)

Vincent van Gogh

Oil on canvas

1889