“In general when people don’t know where a painting is, they say it’s in a private collection in Switzerland. That’s the standard response.”

Where is the Portrait of Dr Gachet now? Since the historical auction in 1990, the artwork has never been on view to the public again. Its last three decades begin in Japan and lead to an Austrian – and shady business dealings in the Caribbean. Finally, Johannes comes surprisingly close to the work’s present owner in New York. Which is not to say that the Portrait of Dr Gachet couldn’t also be in Switzerland.

FINDING VAN GOGH is a podcast series by the Städel Museum in Frankfurt, Germany, in cooperation with Johannes Nichelmann and Jakob Schmidt.

Find out more on www.findingvangogh.com

Media partners: magazin.de/">Monopol Magazin für Kunst und Leben, Lage der Nation - der wöchentliche Politik-Podcast aus Berlin

picture credits: Vincent van Gogh, Portrait of Dr Gachet, 1890, private collection, photo: Bridgeman Images

“I absolutely hated taking auctions. I was incredibly nervous. I was paralyzed with fear is really the answer.”

The Portrait of Dr Gachet has meanwhile changed owners thirteen times – and now it’s writing art market history. How did it come about: the historical auction where the painting broke all the price records? Johannes travels to Christie’s in London to meet with Christopher Burge, the auctioneer who auctioned the portrait in 1990. Burge recounts how not only the prices but also something else exploded in New York at the time. What path has the international art market taken since then?

FINDING VAN GOGH is a podcast series by the Städel Museum in Frankfurt, Germany, in cooperation with Johannes Nichelmann and Jakob Schmidt.

Find out more on www.findingvangogh.com

Media partners: magazin.de/">Monopol Magazin für Kunst und Leben, Lage der Nation - der wöchentliche Politik-Podcast aus Berlin

picture credits: Vincent van Gogh, Portrait of Dr Gachet, 1890, private collection, photo: Bridgeman Images // Giovanna Bertazzoni, photo: Christie’s Images Limited

“Essentially, it’s like this: You need life for art to be created!”

The Portrait of Dr Gachet is in storage in a granary in Berlin along with thousands of other confiscated artworks. Here it comes to the attention of one of the leading National Socialists: Hermann Göring wants to turn it into cash abroad. By a circuitous route, the work finds its way into the possession of a Jewish family in Amsterdam who are compelled to flee the Nazis themselves a short time later The Portrait of Dr Gachet goes to New York with them. There it not only witnesses how times change, but also how the image of van Gogh evolves: Is there any truth in the myth of the mad genius? Can van Gogh’s art be separated from his biography?

The art market likewise changes its perception of van Gogh, and the prices for his art soar. Exactly one hundred years after its execution, the painting’s owners decide to sell it.

FINDING VAN GOGH is a podcast series by the Städel Museum in Frankfurt, Germany, in cooperation with Johannes Nichelmann and Jakob Schmidt.

Find out more on www.findingvangogh.com

Media partners: magazin.de/">Monopol Magazin für Kunst und Leben, Lage der Nation - der wöchentliche Politik-Podcast aus Berlin

picture credits: Vincent van Gogh, Portrait of Dr Gachet, 1890, private collection, photo: Bridgeman Images // Benno Reifenberg, 1943, DLA Marbach

“His face displays the pain-filled expression of our time.”

Frankfurt, Germany, 1905. Georg Swarzenski is appointed director of the Städel at the age of 30. He wants to open the richly traditional museum for exciting new art. In 1911, he purchases the Portrait of Dr Gachet in Paris – an act that makes a strong statement in the unyielding German Empire. Swarzenski very skilfully develops the Städel into a modern museum. In 1933, however, when he is at the height of his career, the Third Reich descends upon him. Swarzenski is of Jewish descent but not only personally under existential threat: his lifework, the modern collection, is also the target of attack. The Portrait of Dr Gachet, the silent observer of all these goings-on, is confiscated in 1937 and declared “degenerate art”. This is a chapter in the painting’s history that bears witness to the brutal and contradictory ideology of the National Socialists – and to the importance they attach to art.

FINDING VAN GOGH is a podcast series by the Städel Museum in Frankfurt, Germany, in cooperation with Johannes Nichelmann and Jakob Schmidt.

Find out more on www.findingvangogh.com

Media partners: magazin.de/">Monopol Magazin für Kunst und Leben, Lage der Nation - der wöchentliche Politik-Podcast aus Berlin

picture credits: Vincent van Gogh, Portrait of Dr Gachet, 1890, private collection, photo: Bridgeman Images

“He painted it really not just as a portrait of Dr Gachet but as a self-portrait and as a portrait of the modern artist. And also the state of mind of the modern world.”

Johannes and the curator Alexander Eiling are standing in the Städel Museum’ storage room – in front of an empty picture frame. It is the frame that once held the Portrait of Dr Gachet, which was in the Städel collection until 1937. The present owner: anonymous. The museum long made every effort to obtain the painting as a loan for its upcoming van Gogh exhibition – in vain. Instead, the empty picture frame will serve in the show as a reminder of the work’s breath-taking history. The tale begins in Auvers-sur-Oise, a small town outside Paris. It is there that van Gogh paints the portrait of his doctor just a few weeks before he commits suicide. How is the painting linked to van Gogh’s own biography? What makes it a masterwork?

FINDING VAN GOGH is a podcast series by the Städel Museum in Frankfurt, Germany, in cooperation with Johannes Nichelmann and Jakob Schmidt.

Find out more on www.findingvangogh.com

Media partners: magazin.de/">Monopol Magazin für Kunst und Leben, Lage der Nation - der wöchentliche Politik-Podcast aus Berlin

picture credits: Vincent van Gogh, Portrait of Dr Gachet, 1890, private collection, photo: Bridgeman Images // Dr. Paul-Ferdinand Gachet, ca. 1890, Van Gogh Museum (Tralbaut archive) // The empty picture frame of Vincent van Gogh’s “Portrait of Dr Gachet” in the storage room of the Städel Museum, 2001, photo: Holde Schneider

In search of the legendary Portrait of Dr Gachet

The last great portrait by Vincent van Gogh disappeared from the public eye three decades ago. It was sold at auction in New York in 1990 – at what was then the highest price ever paid for a painting. The podcast series FINDING VAN GOGH sets out in search of the legendary masterwork, exploring its eventful history along the way. To this end, the journalist Johannes Nichelmann travels around Europe, and even as far as New York, to talk to contemporary witnesses, experts and van Gogh enthusiasts. They shed light on how the Portrait of Dr Gachet came to reflect the last 130 years of art and society, how it came to be linked with personal fates, and how the mechanisms of the art market and the art world work. And not least importantly, FINDING VAN GOGH asks: How do an artwork and its maker become a legend?

FINDING VAN GOGH is a podcast series by the Städel Museum in Frankfurt, Germany, in cooperation with Johannes Nichelmann and Jakob Schmidt.

Available 12 September 2019

Find out more on www.findingvangogh.com

Media partners: magazin.de/">Monopol Magazin für Kunst und Leben, Lage der Nation - der wöchentliche Politik-Podcast aus Berlin