Big birthday party Van Gogh Museum on 2 June with royal guest of honour

Art Calendar, 22 May 2023

One of the most beautiful museums in the world, the Van Gogh Museum is celebrating its 50th birthday with a very big party. On 2 June, the museum invites you to the Sunflower Art Festival. @studio.drift has planned an aerial performance with 200 drones that will bring Van Gogh's work to life in the air.

Even Princess Beatrix will be in attendance.

Photo: Jan Kees Steenman

Self portrait ©Van Gogh Museum

Art Calendar, 20 May 2023: On 2 June 2023, it will be exactly 50 years since the Van Gogh Museum opened its doors. The museum invites you to the Sunflower Art Festival: a festive afternoon with a concert by members of the Royal Concertgebouw Orchestra and a film. Artist duo DRIFT have planned an aerial performance with 200 drones, bringing Van Gogh's work to life in the air.

Royal visit

Princess Beatrix will be present at the anniversary celebrations on the Museumplein. During the event, the director of the Van Gogh Museum, Emilie Gordenker, will present the Princess with a sunflower. The Princess' mother, Princess Juliana, also received a sunflower when the museum opened 50 years ago. Princess Beatrix will then take part in a guided tour of the museum, during which she will see the highlights of the exhibition Van Gogh in Auvers. His last months.

During the tour, the Princess will walk with three former directors of the Van Gogh Museum: Ronald de Leeuw, John Leighton and Axel Rueger. Princess Beatrix will then meet members of the Van Gogh family and several winners of the inspiration competition organised to mark the 50th anniversary.

Vincent on Friday: 50 Years of the Van Gogh Museum

From 19:00 to 23:30, visitors are welcome to the museum to enjoy a programme of music, dance, film and stories. Performers include Nnelg (formerly known as Yung Nnelg), the hip-hop collective Rens, Jaïr & Ome Uncle, ISH Dance Collective, the storytelling collective Mezrab, Fatima Ferrari, Donn Stone and DJ Dey.Rey.

In the anniversary year, the museum first celebrated the Van Gogh family with the exhibition "The Choice of Vincent", because without their unconditional support, the museum would not have existed.

The current Auvers exhibition

is dedicated to the masterpieces Vincent painted during the last months of his life when he stayed in Auvers.

From 13 October 2023 - 14 January 2024

Visitors can admire the view that Van Gogh, Seurat, Signac, Bernard and Angrand had on the banks of the Seine with the exhibition Van Gogh along the Seine.

Almond Blossums ©Van Gogh Museum

Sunflowers ©Van Gogh Museum

The Van Gogh Museum, a long road to the opening of the museum

When Van Gogh died in 1890 at the age of 37, he left behind about 900 paintings and 1,100 drawings. He had sold very few and his brother, the gallery owner Theo Van Gogh, was the sole heir. In addition to his brother's works, the latter had also collected works by Paul Gauguin, Henri de Toulouse-Lautrec, Léon Lhermitte and Jean-François Millet. Unfortunately, Theo died only one year after Vincent. His widow Johanna van Gogh-Bonger organised the first exhibitions of Vincent van Gogh's works and made a significant contribution to making the artist known to a wider public. In 1905, the first major exhibition took place at the Stedelijk Museum in Amsterdam, while the Rijksmuseum had refused to accept loans of van Gogh's works.

Today, the Van Gogh Museum is an art museum on Museumplein in Amsterdam's Oud-Zuid district. It houses the largest collection of works by the Dutch painter Vincent van Gogh. The museum has been open to the public again since 1 May 2013 after renovations and a temporary move to another building. In 2016, the house had over 2 million visitors, making it one of the most visited art museums in the world.

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