Sunflowers or Vase with Fifteen Sunflowers (August 1888) - National Gallery, London, England

Van Gogh began painting in late summer 1888 and continued into the following year. One went to decorate his friend Paul Gauguin's bedroom. The paintings show sunflowers in all stages of life, from fully in bloom to withering. The paintings were innovative for their use of the yellow spectrum, partly because newly invented pigments made new colours possible. In a letter to his brother Theo, van Gogh wrote: the sunflower is mine in a way.

On March 31, 1987, even those without interest in art were made aware of van Gogh's Sunflowers series when Japanese insurance magnate Yasuo Goto paid the equivalent of USD $39,921,750 for Van Gogh's Still Life: Vase with Fifteen Sunflowers at auction at Christie's London, at the time a record-setting amount for a work of art.^[1] The price was over four times the previous record of about $12 million paid for Andrea Mantegna's Adoration of the Magi in 1985. The record was broken a few months later with the purchase of another Van Gogh, Irises by Alan Bond for $53.9 million at Sotheby's, New York on November 11, 1987.

While it is uncertain whether Yaso Goto bought the painting himself or on behalf of his company, the Yasuda Fire and Marine Insurance Company of Japan, the painting currently resides at Seiji Togo Yasuda Memorial Museum of Modern Art in Tokyo. After the purchase a controversy arose whether this is a genuine van Gogh or an Emile Schuffenecker forgery.

Many of Van Gogh's sunflower paintings resemble each other but all have unique qualities.

Sunflower still lifes painted in Arles

<gallery> Image:Van Gogh Vase with Three Sunflowers.jpg|Vase with three sunflowers (Arles, August 1888). Private collection, United States. Image:Van Gogh Vase with Five Sunflowers.jpg|Vase with five sunflowers (Arles, August 1888). Destroyed by fire in World War II on 6 August 1945. http://www.vggallery.com/painting/p_0459.htm Image:Vincent Willem van Gogh 128.jpg|Vase with Twelve Sunflowers (Arles, August 1888). Neue Pinakothek, Munich, Germany. Image:Van Gogh Twelve Sunflowers.jpg|Vase with twelve flowers (Arles, January 1889). Philadelphia Museum of Art, Philadelphia, United States. Image:Van Gogh Vase with Fifteen Sunflowers Amsterdam.jpg|Vase with Fifteen Sunflowers (Arles, January, 1889). Van Gogh Museum, Amsterdam, Netherlands. Image:Van Gogh Vase with Fifteen Sunflowers.jpg|Vase with Fifteen Sunflowers (Arles, January 1889). Sompo Japan Museum of Art, Tokyo, Japan.

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External links

• Sunflowers, the complete series of paintings.
• Analysis of two sunflower paintings.
• Account of the controversy over van Gogh forgeries

References

• Welsh-Ovcharov, Bogomila: The Ownership of Vincent van Gogh's Sunflowers, Burlington Magazine, March 1998, pp. : listing eleven still lifes of sunflowers, four in Paris and seven in Arles.
• Dorn, Roland: Van Gogh's 'Sunflowers' series: the fifth toile de 30, Van Gogh Museum Journal 1999, pp. 42-61.

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