Van Gogh Museum, Amsterdam

No doubt this museum has the largest Van Gogh collection (200 paintings) but… - here I might sound somewhat iconoclast - the dark paintings of his early period in Den Haag or Drenthe are not necessarily his highlights. Not everybody has to be fond of his potato subjects.

It is clearly written in the welcome leaflet of the museum: "His evolution from an inept but impassioned novice into a truly original master…" and "as a painter, he was largely self-taught."

This is evident from this chronological exhibition. Van Gogh experimented a lot and his experiments were not necessarily successful.
His art improved when Vincent reached Paris and assimilated the style of the Impressionist trend.
It appears that the talent of Van Gogh developed in the same proportion as the intensity of the sunlight. The summit is reached under the sun of the Provence.
The highlights of this Van Gogh collection are therefore to be found in the works of Arles (1888-89), Saint-Rémy de Provence (1889-90) and Auvers-sur-Oise where he committed suicide in July 1890.
Among the best works here on display are the "Yellow House", "The Bedroom", the 3 orchard paintings and my favoured ones "The Irises" and the quiet and peaceful landscape "The Harvest".
Impressive and disturbing is that extraordinary "Wheatfield with Crows" painted shortly before his dead.

On the third floor are a good number of French impressionists among which Monet and Pissarro.

There are often queues and crowds at this museum which is on the list of group visits. There are separate fast lanes for e-tickets and museum cards.
As this was my second visit I arrived around 17 h. when there was no queue anymore and I rushed through the early period of van Gogh to concentrate on the best paintings from the Provence period.

Museum open: daily 9.00 to 18.00 (in winter 9 - 17 h), Friday 9.00 to 22.00 h.
Admission fees (from 1/04/2015):
Adults: € 17
0-17 years: free
Tickets can be ordered online.

For photos read this:
"5.1.g. g. not make any photographs or record any video footage if this involve the use of lamps, flash equipment and/or tripod without prior written consent from the Van Gogh Museum. Photography for personal use is not allowed, except in designated areas. "

Dedicated to Van Gogh, this museum contains the world's largest collection by the artist. It also exhibits works by some of Van Gogh's contemporaries, such as Manet, Gauguin, Seurat, and Monet. I would consider this to be the best museum in Amsterdam, but unfortunately, so does every visitor to Amsterdam. Getting into the museum was a bit of a hellish experience whether or not you buy a general admission ticket in advance. We actually had to return the following day because the queue was impossibly long. The only type of advance ticket that works well is the "timed ticket" that gives you access at a specific day and time. Otherwise, the general admission ticket like ours doesn't do much good.

A visit to the Van Gogh museum is one of the "must do" activities on any trip to Amsterdam. The museum is well laid out and therefore very easy to navigate. The museum is spread over four floors with each floor dedicated to a distinct phase in the artist's life. In places, particularly around Van Gogh's more famous works, it tends to get a little crowded but the museum is designed to handle large numbers of visitors and so it is not too bad as long as you are patient. If you wish to avoid the crowds then pre-book tickets and visit early in the morning.

Open daily from 09:00 - 17:00 (open until 22:00 on Fridays).

Admission: €15.00

The most extensive collection of dutch painter Vincent van Gogh -almost 200 paintings and 400 drawings - can be found in the Van Gogh-Museum in Amsterdam. Among his most famous works here are the "Sunflowers", "Almond Blossoms", "Potato Eaters" and "The Yellow House". The relatively young Museum (opened 1973) draws ca. 1,5 Million visitors each year! The collection also features works from other painters (Manet, Gauguin etc.) who either influenced Van Gogh or were in turn inspired by him,

Here they have the largest collection of paintings by Vincent van Gogh in the world, plus special exhibitions.

The museum is open every day from 10:00 to 18:00, Fridays till 22:00. No photography is allowed inside. And no smoking, of course.

Second photo: As for the Rijksmuseum, you can now order and print tickets for the Van Gogh Museum online, to avoid standing in long lines like these folks are doing.

In May 2013 after a half year of internal renovation the Van Gogh Museum re-opened with their collection on full display.

It's the number two tourist attraction and most visitors don't need a push. Just be there early enough to avoid standing in line for hours.

Admission: € 15.00 (Adult)

Hours:
Daily: 9AM - 5PM (6PM in high season).

The complete Van Gogh collection (part of which is visible at the Amsterdam Hermitage museum until 25/04/2013) will be again visible at the usual address on the Museumplein.
On this occasion a special exhibition called "Van Gogh aan het werk - Van Gogh at work" will be visible from 1 May 2013 until 12 January 2014.

Hereafter the announcement of the museum:
"Once refurbishment of the Van Gogh Museum has been completed, many of Van Gogh's outstanding works will be brought together in a special exhibition, to mark the conclusion of eight years’ research into the artist’s methods and the 160th anniversary of his birth. So this momentous anniversary show will provide an exceptionally fine overview of Van Gogh’s multi-faceted oeuvre."

As nothing is said from 26/04 till 1/05 I suppose that those days the works will not be visible because of their transfer from the Hermitage to the Museumplein.

Furthermore a symposium on "Van Gogh’s Studio Practice" is announced on 24-26 June 2013.
"From May 2013 to January 2014 the Van Gogh Museum, in close collaboration with the Cultural Heritage Agency of the Netherlands and Shell, will present the results of an innovative and interdisciplinary research on Van Gogh’s working methods in the context of his time to a larger public."

update 2013
will be open again may first
temperary some paintings in the Hermitage till 25th april
So check the site if it is open.

Opening hours from 1 May 2013

Van Gogh Museum, Paulus Potterstraat 7 Amsterdam:

1 May: 10 am - 6 pm.
2 May to 1 September 2013: daily 9 am until 6 pm, Friday until 10 pm.
2 September to 26 December 2013: daily 9 until to 5 pm, Friday until 10 pm.
27 December 2013 to 5 January 2014: daily 9 until to 6 pm, Friday until 10 pm.
From 6 January 2014: daily 9 am until 5 pm, Friday until 10 pm.

Closed 1 January 2014.

Admission fees
cant see the prices yet think 15 euros

0-17 years: free admission (can be asked for ID)
Museum card holders: free admission* Museumkaart
Members of ICOM: free admission*
I Amsterdam card holders: free admission
There is no special rate for groups or students.
You can also buy your ticket online

not aloud to film or make photo's inside
also no big bags , water, umbrellas aloud inside

My granddaughter's favorite painter is Van Gogh, so I thought she would enjoy the Van Gogh Museum. We had some difficulty finding the Van Gogh museum from the canal boat tour - the boat driver said it was behind the Rijksmuseum, which is huge. We walked around to the backside (dodging construction), but we didn't see the museum. We kept walking and came to a park area with kiosks down the side selling food (which I later found was Museumplein), and I asked directions there. The lady said it was the second building on the right if we kept going straight ahead to the next block, and she was right. It was an extremely unprepossessing modern building.

We got to the museum about 1100. No pictures were allowed inside, but they charged my granddaughter as a child so her ticket was free and I just paid for mine. We got a free wheelchair and went up to the first floor where she would park me opposite a sign to read and then zoom around on her own. She was fascinated by the nude child painting and we stayed a long time at the exhibit that explained how Van Gogh overpainted a lot of his canvases. We went up to the next floor and she sat for awhile at the computer terminal and read some of the letters etc. That website is available outside of the museum, so she can do farther research if she wants. We went down and looked at the shop and bought some post cards, and then turned in the wheelchair and left the museum.

We visited the museum on our last afternoon in Amsterdam arriving around 2:30pm and found entry very quick and easy as there were only 10 people in the line waiting for tickets.

Once we gained entry we then had to line up to pass through the security checkpoint. No bags were allowed and lockers were provided to secure your gear. All up this took around 10 minutes to pass security.

Inside the museum I found it crowded, in fact I was always 2 or 3 people back from the exhibits mainly because of my height . Many people forced their way to the front, some remained for endless time in front of the masterpieces. I found this a little disappointing.

The quality of the exhibit was outstanding and I left feeling satisfied that I had made the effort to attend. Do not let the crowds or long waiting time put you off, make Van Gogh Museum a high priority.

Open daily from 10am to 6pm, on fridays 10am to 10pm.
Audio tours are available. No photographs allowed.

Netherland's famous painter Vincent Van Gogh has a nice museum with his works.
Located in the Museums square - Museumplein.
The museum is ranked as the most visited museum in the Netherlands and one of the most visited museums in the world.

Entrance to the museum will cost 14 Euro for adults.

Trivial statement, that only a hairbreadth separates the genius from the madman sometimes. All this is especially valid for one of the trailblazers of the modern European painting, Vincent Van Gogh. The exceptionally characteristic mode of expression, the richness of the picturesque solutions, which we may admire in his single works, may be measurable only to Rembrandt.

Nowhere in the world is there a larger collection of works by the Impressionist painter Vincent van Gogh than in the elegant Amsterdam museum that bears his name.
In the world largest collection - more than 200 paintings, 437 drawings and 31 prints - you may track the path of life of the painter genius. The collection is housed in two buildings: the main building, which opened in 1973, and the exhibition wing, designed by Kisho Kurokawa and opened in 1999.

The exhibition is organised chronologically into five periods: The Netherlands, Paris, Arles, Saint-Remy and Auvers-sur-Oise.
The museum delights the visitors also with other interesting exhibitions being attached to 19th century art history. You may compare his works with the works of other artists of 19th century. Vincent life and his art is equivalent to the romantic artist myth, the roots of which date back to the Renaissance, and crystalized finally just in the 19th century in its significant form being effective until today.

The works of the artist who lived in constant poverty now fetch record prices. The oil on canvas Portrait of Dr. Gachet is among the ten most expensive works of art in the world. It was sold for USD 82.5 million in 1990, and Vincent sold only one painting, the Red Vineyard, during his lifetime.

Your visit in Amsterdam would not be perfect without Vincent and in the Museum shop you can buy some fine art prints. The I Amsterdam Card gives you free entry, and a shorter line to get in.
New!! From Degas at the Musée d'Orsay to Kandinsky at Amsterdam's Van Gogh Museum, new art exhibits are already heralding the start of spring. And what better way to fuel an art-inspired escape than by
wrapping your travels around one of these five shows? Just book a ticket, and let our itinerary guide your getaway.
Go Now »
Friday evening the Museum stays open until 22.00 with special events.
Opening times & admission fees: http://www3.vangoghmuseum.nl/vgm/index.jsp?page=194&lang=en
WebMuseumVincent http://www.vangoghgallery.com/

This was another museum with a wing temporarily closed during our visit but no matter: it didn't crimp the experience much. I have seen quite a number of Van Goghs in New York, Paris, Chicago, Minneapolis and other cities but this is the largest collection of his works - although not necessarily the best.

Where this exhibit shines is how they've broken the pieces into progressive periods so you can see how his style changed - sometimes radically - every couple of years. The early works are very dark and lacking in those brilliant colors and textures that most of us recognize him by. It was a move to Paris and exposure to French Impressionism through new friends like Gauguin, Lautrec, Degas and Pissarro that inspired that pure, energetic palette of his later periods along with the occasional "borrowing" of techniques that he admired.

Like so many creative talents, his talent went largely unrecognized beyond his circle of contemporaries until after his death but he was a prodigious painter during his short decade as an artist. The collection is an interesting visual journey of a tortured soul desperately seeking sanity through his art.

Photography isn't allowed in this museum so I'm including my snaps from others that illustrate styles and subject matter. They are:

"The Starry Night", 1889, Museum of Modern Art, NYC
"Peasant Woman digging in front of her Cottage", 1885, Art Institute of Chicago
"The Bedroom" (of Yellow House in Arles), 1889, Art Institute of Chicago
"First Steps (after Millet)", 1890, Metropolitan Museum of Art, NYC
"Self Portrait with Straw Hat", 1887, Metropolitan Museum of Art, NYC

The museum is open daily 10:00 AM to 6:00 PM, and on Friday to 22:00. Entry fee at time of this writing is €14 per adult and free for ages 0-17 years. Entry is also included on the I Amsterdam pass. There is an onsite cafe and museum shop, and the building is handicap accessible.

You can get some fun 360-degree looks at the museum here.

NOTE: illustrations included here are not for reproduction

I'm a big fan of van Gogh's art, especially his later psychedelic works. So visiting the van Gogh Museum was a must. I was not disappointed! The museum is fairly big, yet not too large, so if you don't have time for the Rijksmuseum (National Museum) and enjoy psychedelic paintings, this is the place to go. It's also the place to go if you want to visit the van Gogh and the Rijksmuseum because they're both conveniently located at Museumplein (Museum Square), which, in addition to be surrounded by museums, is a nice and relaxing park for people watching or eating a picnic lunch. Be sure to have your photo taken at the "I AMSTERDAM" sign or take photos of others climbing around on it. That's is almost as fun as visiting the van Gogh Museum.

Hubby went in here and we waited outside. The lines weren't too bad however I would pre-purchase tickets for faster entry.

Hubby enjoyed it and purchased a nice canvas print of the famous flower pic. We just need to find a wall now to put it on.

2nd picture is of Birgit and myself waiting for Howie to come out.