The Real Van Gogh: The Artist and His Letters

The Scotsman“You cannot stand in front of one of his great canvasses and be unmoved...” This is five star art if ever there was, but because of the layout it cannot be a five star exhibition. Typically the pages of a letter are followed by tiny drawings, each with a label, then by a canvas that has another wordy label...

The Observer“The letters are full of insights – quite literally...” In one of the late letters, he rounds on abstraction. There is the whole of life, after all, just waiting to be disentangled. And one of the thrills of this show – there is no other word – is watching this happen...

Financial Times“A marvellously nuanced retrospective...” In this once-in-a-generation show, allowing us to see his achievement through his own prism of restlessness and struggle, he appears greater and deeper than ever, both as man and artist...

Time Out“I left clear-headed and relaxed...” Despite all the bobbing heads and sharp elbows any such oversubscribed show entails, this is a calming display of Van Gogh. His vision cuts through the crowds, the works speaking as clearly as the words...

this is london“As for the real van Gogh - for that we need a séance with Sigmund...” Gives the impression that this is an exhibition of what the pleading Academy was allowed to borrow rather than of what it really wanted and needed. Even so, it makes a fair fist of the earlier years and many visitors may well be enough surprised...

Guardian“His writing gives little hint of a troubled mind...” Sometimes the drawings in his letters seem more lively and better than the paintings they refer to. They have a casual intensity. The letters are fragile and intimate scraps. But it is the drawings that do most for me...

The Telegraph“We can see the paintings through his eyes...” It's easy to let what we know about Van Gogh’s life to colour the way we look at his art. The genius of this show is that the artist himself tells us in his own words to look again and see what is really there, not what our imaginations have added.

The Times“Sensationalism is constantly downplayed...” Van Gogh suffered great mental anguish and bouts of terrible madness. But he neither wrote nor painted at these moments. His works are not the overspill of insanity. They are, his letters suggest, carefully premeditated and profoundly reflective...

Art Review“Not yet reviewed”

The Independent“Not yet reviewed”