Purchased at a Christie’s auction in March 1987 for US 39.9 million dollars by Japanese insurance magnate, Yasuo Goto, of the Yasuda Fire and Marine Insurance Company of Japan, the painting’s sale immediately stirred public controversy. Soon after, doubts surfaced of the work’s authenticity due to its hefty and astounding price tag (“Van Gogh’s Sunflowers”). It was a record amount of money paid for any piece of artwork at the time and experts were quick to draw comparisons of the Yasuda Sunflowers to two other similar versions of the work, the authentic original held by the National Gallery in London, and a genuine copy housed in the Van Gogh Museum in Amsterdam (Plagens and Chang, 72). This situation has left many observers with a pivotal question: Compared to the other existing versions of Sunflowers, was the auction price justified for the purchase of a reputable copy of the original work, or was the painting of the Yasuda Sunflowers just a fake?
Still Life: Vase with Fifteen Sunflowers
Vincent van Gogh
Oil on canvas
93.0 x 73.0 cm.
August 1888
National Gallery, London
The specific predicament with regards to the Yasuda Sunflowers seems to be its artistic discrepancies. Historians proffer this claim by propounding that the influx of suspected fake pieces is partly attributed to van Gogh’s “stylistic inconsistencies” (Ryback). Van Gogh experimented with various painting styles during his time in Arles, and among his repertoire were quick pieces done of lackluster quality, which cast doubt on some of his genuine, but poorly done paintings. In addition, suspicion of the validity of the Yasuda copy arose from van Gogh’s choice of material medium. As Will Bennett describes, the Yasuda copy is painted on jute sacking, which puzzles many experts since van Gogh’s preferred choice of material to paint on was French canvas (Feilchenfeldt). Other experts such as Ella Hendriks, of the Van Gogh Museum in Amsterdam, claim that “Van Gogh truly wrestled with this picture and ironically it is the results of this struggle that have given the critics reason to regard the work as a forgery” (Bennett, 17). Inconsistencies in van Gogh’s reporting of his experimentations with his Sunflowers paintings, copies, and sketches, through correspondence with his brother, Theo, also make it easy for forgers to falsify the authenticity of their creations. Part of this quandary with the proof of validity arose because most of van Gogh’s works were neither catalogued nor sold during his lifetime, which made it difficult to legitimize his work, something that would have been done at the time of a sale (Plagens and Chang, 72). By observing why so many forgers targeted van Gogh as the subject of their falsifications, especially his Sunflowers painting, we are able to pinpoint some facets of his artistic style and thereby understand why the original version of Sunflowers is ultimately valued so highly in our culture.
Still Life: Vase with Fifteen Sunflowers
Vincent van Gogh
Oil on canvas
100.5 x 76.5 cm.
January 1889
Yasuda Kasai Museum of Art, Tokyo
Upon close inspection, it is important to note the inconsistencies and artistic differences, between the Yasuda Sunflowers and the London original, which draw the largest debate over suspected forgery. In an analysis performed by Alain Tarica, a Paris art dealer, several characteristics become staunchly clear – his investigation was further scrutinized in Ryback’s article, “The So-Called Van Goghs.” On the right side of the Yasuda painting, there is a stem that is bent to accommodate space for the disproportionate flowers compared to the smooth stem depicted in the original work (Ryback). Also, some petals are illustrated to be floating free from the center of the flower. On the bottom-left side of the painting, a careful look at the stem reveals that it penetrates the middle of a leaf rather than attaching to it in the original piece. These stylistic subtleties, easily overlooked by a superficial glance, play a role in stirring more controversy regarding the artist’s credibility. The differences are considered so great that Tarica explains this poor replication is caused by the suspected forger’s poor skill with the thick impasto used to paint (Ryback). BBC journalist Geraldine Norman even claims there to be “overwhelming” evidence that disproves the authenticity of the work (Ryback). Milan enthusiast Antonio de Robertis only adds to these reactions (“Van Gogh’s Sunflowers”). His contention rests on the premise that in all of van Gogh’s correspondence to his brother, there is no distinct mention of his experimentations performed on the Yasuda copy of Sunflowers. Evidently, we must assess the validity of these critics’ opinions, some of which are rooted in suspicion rather than grounded in factual evidence. Therefore, we must be wary of the claimed theory of forgery and realize that in effect, this inquiry of van Gogh’s work affords us, and art scholars alike, the chance to identify his stylistic traits, hence affecting an overall admiration for and amplified cultural value of his work.
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