Edvard Munch, 'Felix Auerbach', 1906, oil on canvas, 85.4 x 77.1 cm, Van Gogh Museum, Amsterdam (purchased with support from the BankGiro Loterij, the Rembrandt Association, with the additional support of the Maljers-de Jongh Fund, and the Prins Bernhard Cultuurfonds, the VSB Foundation and the members of The Yellow House)
Here to Stay: A decade of remarkable acquisitions and their stories features a large selection of artworks that have been added to the acclaimed museum collection in the past 10 years.
The exhibition introduces the full extent of the Van Gogh Museum collection area: from paintings and drawings to prints, sculptures and letters. Most of the remarkable artworks in this exhibition are not by Van Gogh, but rather by his contemporaries.
Here to Stay features a surprising array of artists: major names including Edvard Munch, Henri de Toulouse-Lautrec, Claude Monet and Edgar Degas, but also lesser-known artists such as Henri Guérard and Adolphe Appian.
Aside from the artworks themselves, the stories behind the acquisitions play a central role. Curators offer a glimpse behind the scenes, explain why a museum collects works and why it is so important that museums continue to do so, and also introduce their personal take on the artworks.
The stories of people from outside of the museum also accompany the artworks in this exhibition. Especially for Here to Stay, collectors, museum supporters and 10 Amsterdam residents were invited to reveal their favourite acquisitions from the past decade.
By introducing the stories of a range of people, including an older resident of the Museum Quarter, a secondary school student, a youth worker from the District of Nieuw-West and the Amsterdam city poet, the museum offers visitors different perspectives on individual works.
Claude Monet, 'Tulip Fields near The Hague', 1886, oil on canvas, 66 x 81.5 cm, Van Gogh Museum, Amsterdam (State of the Netherlands)
Virtual preview
The Here to Stay exhibition is open to everyone on the museum’s website, offering visitors an impression of the exhibition from home.
The virtual preview invites visitors to ‘walk’ – just like an actual museum visit – passed several highlights from Here to Stay, allowing them to come face-to-face with the artworks online.
The various perspectives – which play such a key role in the exhibition – are illuminated throughout the preview. When viewing Félix Vallotton’s print series Intimités (1897-1898), visitors can select the story of curator Fleur, who describes the work as a ‘ten-round boxing match between the sexes’, or an alternative perspective of the work offered by storage facility manager Hans-Martijn, who recounts the special significance of the artwork to him, as it was the very first piece that he was allowed to put on display in the museum.
Felix Vallotton, 'Laziness (La paresse)', 1896, woodcut in black, 25 x 33 cm, Van Gogh Museum, Amsterdam (purchased with support from the BankGiro Loterij)
Supporters
Here to Stay: A decade of remarkable acquisitions and their stories was realised with the assistance of the museum’s main supporters, the Ministry of Education, Culture and Science, the BankGiro Loterij, Van Lanschot and ASML.
As exhibition partner, the Rembrandt Association made an exceptional contribution to Here to Stay.
The exhibition would also not have been possible without the supporters who played a vital role in realising acquisitions during the past 10 years: the BankGiro Loterij, the Rembrandt Association, the Mondriaan Fonds, the Prins Bernard Cultuurfonds, the VSBfonds, the Triton Collection Foundation, the Turing Foundation, the members of The Yellow House, Mr and Mrs Cheung Chung Kiu, Mr Christopher Drake, and other supporters who wish to remain anonymous.