One of Van Gogh’s most unusual artworks has just emerged—three unknown sketches of peasants. They are drawn on a thin vertical strip of paper, a curious format for an artist to choose. The drawings were found in a novel on the French peasantry and the paper is exactly the same height as the book.
The three sketches are reproduced by The Art Newspaper for the first time. Discoveries of totally unknown Van Gogh drawings are now rare—perhaps once or twice in a decade. The sheet has just gone on display at the Van Gogh Museum in Amsterdam, in a new exhibition on acquisitions, Here to Stay (until 12 September). Although it is presented in the show as simply a trio of sketches, the artwork almost certainly served an unexpected purpose.
Teio Meedendorp, a senior researcher at the Amsterdam museum, told us: “I believe that it was made as a bookmark. It would be curious to draw three sketches in this configuration unless there was a reason, and it fits snugly inside the book in which it was found.”
Vincent, an avid reader, gave his copy of a novel on the French peasantry to his Dutch artist friend Anthon van Rappard. Writing to Van Rappard on 15 June 1883, he said he would be posting a package to him in Utrecht, with prints and a book by the French writers Emile Erckmann and Alexandre Chatrian, whom he greatly admired. Histoire d’un Paysan recounts the story of the French Revolution through the eyes of an Alsace peasant. Illustrated by Théophile Schuler, Vincent assured his friend that “I do think you’ll find the Erckmann-Chatrian beautiful”.
