Van Gogh, the Local View By William Yardley Washingtonpost.com Staff Tuesday, January 13, 1998

"The Road Menders," 1889, by Vincent van Gogh. (Courtesy of the Phillips Collection)

The Washington art and museum community is already buzzing with anticipation of the Dutch Impressionist's rainbow palette – and the crowds that will arrive in town ready for an eyeful of art. Come October, if you're lucky, you'll wait in line for hours and get a ticket for the show.

But in the meantime, if you're wise, you'll walk out the door right this minute, or this weekend, and find splendid works by van Gogh currently on view at four Washington area museums – the Phillips Collection, the Kreeger Museum, the Baltimore Museum of Art and the site of the main event, the National Gallery of Art.

"They're part of the permanent collection so they're always up," says Jett Lamkin, referring to the Kreeger Museum's two paintings by van Gogh, "Bouquet of Zinnias" and "Vase With Flowers," both from 1886. The museum, in Washington's Foxhall neighborhood, is the former home of David and Carmen Kreeger and exhibits works the couple collected, including those by Monet, Picasso, Cezanne, Henry Moore, artists from the Washington Color School and African artists.

Three well-known van Goghs are at the Phillips Collection: "Entrance to the Public Garden in Arles" (1886), "House at Auvers" (1890) and "The Road Menders" (1889). On display in the museum's Goh annex until early April, the three works will be moved to the original Phillips Collection building to make way for a large retrospective of the work of painter and illustrator Richard Diebenkorn, which will occupy the annex from May through August. The van Goghs will return to the annex in September.

"The van Goghs are always, always on view, as often as we can have them up," says Phillips spokesperson Faith Flanagan.

"Bouquet of Zinnias," 1886, by Vincent van Gogh. (Courtesy of the Kreeger Museum)

The Baltimore Museum of Art's Cone Collection contains two small works by van Gogh, "A Pair of Shoes" (1887) and "Landscape With Trees and Figures" (1889). Dr. Claribel Cone and her sister, Miss Etta Cone, traveled to Paris often in the first half of this century to visit the studios of Matisse and Picasso and buy art by other avant-garde artists such as Gauguin, Cezanne and Renoir.

And besides the 70 paintings that will roll in from Amsterdam's Van Gogh Museum this fall, the National Gallery currently has four works on view in its West Wing, "La Mousmé" (1888), "The Olive Orchard" (1889), "Farmhouse in Provence" (1888) and "White Roses" (1890).

The National Gallery is the only East Coast venue for the van Gogh exhibition, which travels to the Los Angeles County Museum in January before the paintings head back to the Netherlands. The show likely will bring art-loving tourists to Washington from all over the East Coast, which means good things for other area art museums, particularly those with van Goghs in their collections, according to Philip Conisbee, curator of French paintings at the National Gallery. "It'll be quite busy," says Conisbee. "There will be more people in town. A lot of people would love to see the van Goghs at the Phillips. They have a wonderful view of Arles."

Indeed, van Gogh may get some timely extra attention at the Phillips this fall through the museum's weekly Artful Evenings program, which focuses on current events in the art world. "If van Gogh's topical, if there's a demand for it, we'll do it," says spokesperson Kristin Krathwohl. "October, that's the time of year when things are jumping."

The Kreeger, one of Washington's newest art museums, may also benefit from an influx of enthusiastic art lovers, who "flow over," says Lamkin.

At the Washington Studio School, which often teaches classes right in the galleries of Washington art museums, faculty head Jo Weiss Le says her students will get to learn firsthand from a master, "There's no stand in for the original work."

What lessons would Le hope students take home from a van Gogh show? "It's hard to look at van Gogh and not comment on the surface structure as well as the composition," she says. "But also, look at his commitment to his passion."

Lois Mailou Jones, one of Washington's art matriarchs, will do her best to make the van Gogh show this fall. Jones's vibrant, African-influenced works are in museums all over the country. Now 92, and still painting, Jones studied van Gogh and French Impressionists while on a fellowship in France in 1937. "It had a great impression on my work. I think [van Gogh's] work is wonderful," says the retired Howard University art professor. "I wouldn't miss it."

And at Cafe Monet in Kensington, they're anticipating crowds will devour another work that bears the artist's name: the "Van Gogh panini." It's layered with smoked salmon, red onions, capers and slices of cucumber.

Here are more ways to enjoy van Gogh right now:

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