Wassily Kandinsky
Autumn Landscape with Boats
The Merzbacher Collection at the Van Gogh Museum From 24 August to 27 November 2016, the Van Gogh Museum presents ‘Van Gogh Inspires: Matisse, Kirchner, Kandinsky: Highlights from the Merzbacher Collection’, showing the impact Vincent van Gogh had on the most important artists of the early twentieth century.]]>
Source: Van Gogh Museum
The focus of the exhibition “Van Gogh Inspires: Matisse, Kirchner, Kandinsky: Highlights from the Merzbacher Collection” is on the way Van Gogh influenced the French Fauvists and German Expressionists. Fourteen works from the Merzbacher Collection are being shown at the Van Gogh Museum, representing the most important Fauvists (including Matisse, Derain, De Vlaminck and Braque) and German Expressionists (such as Kirchner, Kandinsky, Jawlensky and Pechstein).
The selection includes “Interior at Collioure (Afternoon Rest)” by the Fauvist Henri Matisse, “Autumn Landscape with Boats” by the Blaue Reiter artist Wassily Kandinsky, and the expressive “Girl with Cat, Fränzi” by Ernst Ludwig Kirchner of the group Die Brücke. Each is an iconic example of the respective artist’s oeuvre. The private art collection assembled by Werner and Gabrielle Merzbacher is considered one of the finest in the world. All the loans are being shown in the Netherlands for the first time.
Van Gogh’s colourful, animated and emotionally charged paintings offered them a source of inspiration. The vitality of his work encouraged both the Fauvists and the Expressionists in their need to express their emotions through their art. These innovative artists took Van Gogh’s pursuit of freedom in form and colour to a new level. Or, as the Brücke artist Max Pechstein later declared: ‘Van Gogh was the father of us all!’
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