Van Gogh’s painting style can be called the ultimate expression of artistic individuality, and has had a major impact in diverse eras and regions. His originality has inspired not only emulation of his technique, but also admiration for his life as an artist who gave all of himself to painting even while enduring personal tumult. This passion – in two meanings of the word, “emotional intensity” and “agony” – has had a wide-ranging influence on artistic and cultural fields. This exhibition examines the effects Van Gogh has had, which at times reach the level of a social phenomenon, while also exploring the emotive power of his work and the qualities that continue to stir viewers today.

Japan’s first Van Gogh craze took place before World War II. Appreciation for Van Gogh grew through black-and-white reproductions published in magazines such as Shirakaba [White Birch], though few at the time had the chance to see his works in person. Touching on various episodes related to Van Gogh in Japan, this exhibition traces the history of his influence and examines how different aspects of his “passion” were perceived over the decades.

Van Gogh’s life came to an end in 1890, when he was just 37. Since then, the impact of his art has grown exponentially, leading to his towering status today. Over the span of more than a century, how have artists, nourished by Van Gogh’s influence, generated new expressions of passion suited to their own times? From a recently acquired work by Morimura Yasumasa to video installation by Fiona Tan, based in Van Gogh’s native Netherlands, this exhibition presents a rich variety of contemporary variations on Van Gogh, reflecting the diversity of today’s art world.

Van Gogh was born in the Netherlands to a father who was a minister. After giving up the dream of being a missionary, he set his sights on becoming a painter. His early works, dominated by dark, somber tones, are notable for their focus on the theme of labor. Like Jean-François Millet, whose portrayals of farm workers are imbued with reverence, Van Gogh portrayed people working in fields and living humbly, expressing his empathy for their frugal lives with raw honesty.

In 1886, Van Gogh moved to Paris to live with his brother Theo, who had a successful career as an art dealer. That year saw the eighth and final Impressionist exhibition, where the pointillist techniques of Georges Seurat and Paul Signac drew much attention. Immersed in the city’s art scene and the Impressionist and Neo-Impressionist movements, Van Gogh devoted himself to experimentation with new approaches, producing a wealth of vividly colorful works. It was also in Paris that he first encountered Japanese ukiyo-e prints, which would go on to have a profound influence on his art.

In 1888, Van Gogh arrived in Arles in the south of France, a place he deemed a utopia drenched in sunlight and color. There, he dedicated himself to painting with enormous energy. In The Gleize Bridge over the Vigueirat Canal, painted during this period, the blue sky and canal occupy most of the composition, with yellow highlights on parts of the bridge and embankment. Red accents are placed among the green grass lining the embankment and the shrubs on the bridge. Van Gogh was testing the effects of complementary colors, a signature element of his style. After the infamous “ear incident” and the collapse of his living arrangement with Paul Gauguin, Van Gogh left Arles in a state of despair.

Struggling with recurring mental health issues, Van Gogh was admitted to the Saint-Paul de Mausole psychiatric hospital in Saint-Rémy, in southern France. While he was confined to the hospital grounds for weeks at a time and suffered repeated episodes, he continued to paint outdoors in the hospital garden whenever his condition permitted. Clumps of Grass, featuring a rich array of green tones, was painted in that garden. By limiting his focus to a small area of the garden, Van Gogh heightened both the effect of the colors and the presence of the grass itself.

In 1890, Van Gogh moved to Auvers-sur-Oise to undergo treatment with Dr. Gachet, a psychiatrist. Flower Vase with Thistles was painted there about a month before his death. At the center of the canvas is a vivid, spherical thistle flower, from which jagged thistle leaves and ears of wheat radiate outward. Van Gogh’s trademark elongated brushstrokes describe concentric circles on the vase and intersect vertically and horizontally in the background, infusing the work with vibrant energy. It was in Auvers that Van Gogh shot himself in the chest and died two days later, on July 29, 1890.

Maurice de Vlaminck first encountered Van Gogh’s work at a solo exhibition at Galerie Bernheim-Jeune in 1901. What he described as “a almost religious feeling in the interpretation of nature” struck Vlaminck as a revelation, and he began to employ intense colors and thick, ferocious brushwork in his own painting. Van Gogh’s art was a fundamental source of inspiration for Vlaminck’s daring style, which led to his being labeled a Fauve (“wild beast”) at the 1905 Salon d’Automne.

The literary magazine Shirakaba [White Birch], launched in 1910, played a decisive role in introducing Western art to Japan. Among the artists captivated by its reproductions of works from various eras and regions, from the Renaissance to Post-Impressionism, was Kishida Ryusei. His Self-Portrait Wearing a Coat, brimming with rich color and dynamic brushwork, clearly shows the influence of Van Gogh. The painting also marks Ryusei’s break from the plein-air school and boldly proclaims the beginning of a new phase in his development.

Before World War II, the Gachet family residence in Auvers was one of the few places where many Van Gogh works could be viewed together. Dr. Gachet, who had cared for Van Gogh in his final days, preserved more than twenty of the artist’s paintings. Auvers became a pilgrimage site for Van Gogh devotees, and many Japanese visiting or living in France made the journey, including the painter Maeta Kanji. After visiting the cemetery where Van Gogh and his brother Theo are buried, Maeta experienced what he described as a “madness from which I could not seem to awaken.” That same night, back in Paris, he painted the brothers’ graves in a single, impassioned burst.

Van Gogh’s Sunflowers (1888), brought to Japan before World War II and later destroyed in an air raid, was purchased in 1920 by the Kobe industrialist Yamamoto Koyata. It was first shown to the Japanese public the following year at the first Shirakaba Art Museum Exhibition. Sunflowers, painted by Nakamura Tsune the year before his death from tuberculosis, shows Van Gogh’s strong influence in the similar orientation and arrangement of the blooms. Having been tragically lost in the war, Van Gogh’s Sunflowers has taken on nearly mythical status in Japan.

The artist Morimura Yasumasa, renowned for photographic self-portraits in which he transforms himself into historical figures and subjects of iconic artworks, is crucial to the story of Van Gogh’s reception in Japan. As he himself has said, “The first thing one learns about ‘Art’ has got to be Van Gogh.” The first figure he ever impersonated, in 1985, was Van Gogh, specifically the artist’s self-portrait with a bandaged ear. This exhibition offers an overview of Morimura’s many Van Gogh-themed works over the years, including the public debut of a new acquisition by the Pola Museum of Art.

Fukuda Miran is known for works that shatter conventions, often injecting humor into contemporary social issues and themes derived from famous artworks of countries worldwide. Winter – Floral Tribute is her reinterpretation of Van Gogh’s Roses (1890, National Gallery of Art, Washington). In 2011, stunned by the overpowering beauty of Van Gogh’s flower painting at a museum in Tokyo, Fukuda was reminded of the white flowers delivered to her home two winters earlier, following the passing of her father. Based on photographs she took of each flower arrangement, this work also serves as a memorial to victims of the 2011 Great East Japan Earthquake.

Kuwakubo Toru, who began his practice by devising a fictional painter within himself and “having that painter paint,” is known for impasto oil application as thick as Van Gogh’s. Vincent Willem van Gogh’s Studio is part of his Calendar Series, in which he imagines the studios of masters from art history. Works by Van Gogh that today are recognized as masterpieces, and objects associated with him, are assembled on a riverbank amid an atmosphere evoking Van Gogh’s starry night scenes.

Fiona Tan, a visual artist and filmmaker originally from Indonesia and now based in the Netherlands, is acclaimed for her meticulously researched works that blur lines between documentary and fiction. Ascent is constructed from approximately 4,000 photographs of Mount Fuji solicited from members of the public, interweaving images of the mountain from the Edo period (1603-1868) to the present day. Van Gogh is referenced in the work during a discussion of the innovative qualities of ukiyo-e and the Japanese view of nature. With intersecting Western and Japanese perspectives, the work evokes the collective memory of Mount Fuji, and by extension, of Japan itself.