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Van Gogh

Vincent van Gogh (1853–1890) moves to Auvers-sur-Oise, his last place of residence, in the spring of 1890 to obtain help with his physical and mental afflictions from the physician Paul-Ferdinand Gachet. The doctor inspires his last likeness, the “Portrait of Dr Gachet”. A few weeks later, Van Gogh takes his own life in a wheat field in Auvers.

Picture: Jacobus Marinus Wilhelmus de Louw, Vincent van Gogh at age 19, 1873, Van Gogh Museum, Amsterdam (Vincent van Gogh Foundation)

Theo van Gogh (1857–1891) is Vincent’s brother and closest confidant. The two are in extremely close contact; they write each other hundreds of letters. Theo is an art dealer in Paris. He supports his older brother financially and receives his unsaleable paintings in return. Theo dies just a few months after Vincent.

Picture: Ernest Ladrey, Theo van Gogh, ca. 1888, Van Gogh Museum, Amsterdam (Vincent van Gogh Foundation)

Dr. Paul-Ferdinand Gachet (1828–1909) inspires Van Gogh’s last portrait, the “Portrait of Dr Gachet”. The general practitioner has obtained his doctorate with a thesis on melancholy and is also active in the area of alternative medicine. Among other things, he markets a so-called “Elixir of Dr Gachet”. He has a practice in Paris but spends most of his time in the little town of Auvers-sur-Oise, where Van Gogh seeks his help in 1990. Himself an amateur painter and art enthusiast, Gachet is personally acquainted with many artists, among them Gustave Courbet and Paul Cézanne.

Picture: Anonymous, Dr. Paul-Ferdinand Gachet, ca. 1890, Van Gogh Museum (Tralbaut archive)

Johanna van Gogh-Bonger (1862–1925) is the wife of Vincent’s brother Theo. When her husband dies, she inherits both brothers’ estates, which encompass paintings, drawings and letters by Van Gogh. In the years that follow, she organizes numerous exhibitions of her brother-in-law’s work and publishes the correspondence between Vincent and Theo. She thus lays the foundation for Van Gogh’s posthumous success.

Picture: Woodbury & Page, Johanna van Gogh-Bonger, 1889, Van Gogh Museum, Amsterdam (Vincent van Gogh Foundation)

Alice Ruben Faber (1866–1939) is one of the first owners of the “Portrait of Dr Gachet”. She is an artist, collector and art patron who lives in Copenhagen. The photograph that presumably shows her lying in bed pregnant with the unframed portrait on the night table beside her is the first known reproduction of Van Gogh’s likeness.

Picture: Anonymous, Alice Ruben Faber with Van Gogh's “Portrait of Dr Gachet”, 1897

Georg Swarzenski (1876–1957) becomes the director of the Städelsches Kunstinstitut in Frankfurt am Main in 1906, at the age of 30. Shortly thereafter, he also takes charge of the newly founded Städtische Galerie with the aim of assembling a collection of modern art for the museum. Swarzenski acquires primarily French art from Monet to Van Gogh, but also works by German avant-garde artists such as Max Beckmann and Ernst-Ludwig Kirchner. In 1911 he succeeds in purchasing the “Portrait of Dr Gachet”, which becomes a centrepiece of the Städel collection.

A holder of two doctorates, the art historian and lawyer Swarzenski contributes decisively to shaping the museum and Frankfurt’s culture in the 1910s and ’20s. In 1928 he is appointed director general of all the city’s municipal museums. When the National Socialists come to power in 1933, Swarzenski is dismissed from this post on account of his Jewish heritage but manages to hold onto his position as director of the Städelsches Kunstinstitut – a private foundation – for another few years. In 1937 he is dismissed from this office as well and flees to the U.S. with his family.

Picture: Anonymous, Georg Swarzenski, undated

Alfred Wolters (1884–1973) is Georg Swarzenski’s assistant and close confidant from 1912 onwards. When Swarzenski becomes the director general of Frankfurt’s municipal museums, Wolters – at Swarzenski’s request – takes charge of the Städtische Galerie, the collection of modern (at the time contemporary) art at the Städel. As the director of a municipal art collection, he is subject to the directives of the city’s mayor and department of culture. During the Nazi period, he is compelled to direct the gallery – which he and Swarzenski have together built up for more than 20 years – under new conditions and in that context repeatedly comes into conflict with the authorities.

Picture: Anonymous, Alfred Wolters, 1928

Benno Reifenberg (1892–1970) is the chief editor of the Frankfurter Zeitung’s culture section from 1924 to 1930. In 1932 he takes over the politics section and remains in that position until the Nazis prohibit the newspaper in 1943. When the Reich propaganda ministry has the “Portrait of Dr Gachet” confiscated from the Städel in 1937, Reifenberg writes an anonymous commentary about the painting. The newspaper text is one of the few public articles to take issue with National Socialist art policy.

Picture: Anonymous, Benno Reifenberg, 1943, DLA Marbach, www.dla-marbach.de

Franz Koenigs (1881–1941) purchases the “Portrait of Dr Gachet” in 1938 after Hermann Göring – who had taken possession of it – sold it abroad to obtain foreign currency. The banker, a native of Cologne, has lived in Amsterdam since 1920 and owns a large art collection. Soon, however, the painting makes its way from Koenigs’s holdings into those of his banker friend Siegfried Kamarsky, likewise a resident of Amsterdam.

Picture: Marianne Breslauer, Franz Koenigs, 1937, in: Cynthia Saltzman, Bildnis des Dr. Gachet, Frankfurt am Main and Leipzig, 2003, p. 371

Siegfried and Lola Kramarsky (1893–1961 and 1896–1991) get married in Hamburg in 1921. At the banking house Lisser & Rosenkrantz, Siegfried rises to become a partner, and in 1923 he is appointed the director of the Amsterdam branch. Through their friendship with Franz Koenigs, the Kramarskys expand their art collection. It is also by way of Koenigs that they come into possession of the “Portrait of Dr Gachet” in 1938. After the Nazis occupy the Netherlands that same year, the Kramarskys flee to New York by way of Canada with their three children.

The “Portrait of Dr Gachet” remains in the private holdings of Lola Kramarsky (a widow since 1961) until 1990. In the previous three decades, it has repeatedly been on view in exhibitions; in 1984 the family places it on permanent loan to the Metropolitan Museum in New York.

Picture: Anonymous, Siegfried (left) and Lola (far right) Kramarsky with Chaim Weizmann and his wife Vera on an Atlantic crossing on board the Rex in January 1940, in: Cynthia Saltzman, Bildnis des Dr. Gachet, Frankfurt am Main and Leipzig, 2003, p. 371

Ryoei Saito (1916–1996), a Japanese paper industrialist, purchases the Portrait of Dr Gachet in 1990 for 82.5 million dollars; a few days later he buys a similarly expensive painting by Renoir, “Bal au moulin de la Galette” (1876). Saito keeps the “Portrait of Dr Gachet” in a storehouse in Tokyo, probably taking it out only once to show it to business partners. With his alleged wish to take the Gachet with him to his grave, Saito contributes to the formation of the legend around the likeness. By the time of his death in 1996, his company Dai Showa has gone bankrupt and the painting has gone to his creditors.

Picture: Ryoei Saito, 1990, photo: Kurita KAKU/Gamma-Rapho via Getty Images

Wolfgang Flöttl (b. 1955) makes his career in the 1980s and ’90s as an investment banker. For the Austrian BAWAG he handles business deals in the Caribbean for which he ultimately has to answer in court and is made personally liable. At this point in time, it comes out that he has purchased the “Portrait of Dr Gachet” from Japan in 1997 with a loan from Sotheby’s auction house. In 1998, on behalf of the BAWAG, it is sold for 100 million dollars to a buyer who has remained anonymous to this day.

Picture: Wolfgang Flöttl at the Criminal Court in Vienna following the proclamation of the sentence in the BAWAG trial, 2012, photo: Helmut Fohringer / APA