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Secondary sourceDocumentary17 September 2012

Vincent van Gogh: Looking to Japan (Van Gogh Museum Video)

Van Gogh Museum · 17 September 2012

A 2012 Van Gogh Museum video promoting an exhibition on Van Gogh's interest in Japanese art, shown as part of the museum's exhibition programme.

Shows how a modern museum presents Van Gogh's interest in Japanese art and his personal themes to today's public.

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Van Gogh Museum, Vincent van Gogh: Looking to Japan, video, 17 September 2012. Wikimedia Commons.

About this source

What it is

This is a short video made by the Van Gogh Museum in Amsterdam and dated 17 September 2012. It promotes the exhibition Vincent. The Van Gogh Museum in the Hermitage Amsterdam, which ran from 29 September 2012 to 25 April 2013. The video focuses on Van Gogh's interest in Japanese art. It is a modern museum production, not a record made in Van Gogh's lifetime.

Why it matters

The video presents Van Gogh as an artist who was strongly drawn to Japanese prints and objects, an idea that many art historians have studied. The exhibition focused on Van Gogh's personal themes. Because a museum made it to promote a show, it reflects how the museum wants visitors to understand him today, and it gives a modern summary of his interests rather than his own words.

Look closer

  • What does the video choose to show and emphasise about Van Gogh's interest in Japan?
  • Who made this video, and what might they want viewers to do after watching it?
  • What would you need to check, such as Van Gogh's letters or the artworks themselves, before accepting the video's claims?

This documentary is part of the curated material that grounds the AI version of Vincent van Gogh on Humy.ai — when students ask about related events, the AI can quote it and cite it.

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