Van Gogh Museum

The Van Gogh Museum houses a permanent collection dedicated to the best works of art by Vincent van Gogh and several temporary exhibitions.

Vincent van Gogh

Vincent van Gogh was born in Zundert, the Netherlands, in 1853. After receiving a good education, part of which took place in a boarding school, Vincent worked for an art dealer, where he discovered his vocation.

Van Gogh felt lonely as an artist and decided to create an art residency in Arles where he and other similar-minded artists would live and share ideas. The first artist he invited was Paul Gauguin.

Two days before Christmas in 1888, van Gogh had his first mental breakdown when Gauguin announced that he wanted to leave Arles. In a frenzy, Vincent cut off part of his left ear.

One year later, van Gogh was voluntarily hospitalized in a psychiatric hospital. During the year he spent confined in the ward, he lost touch with reality and became extremely depressed.

His mental health worsened with time, and the artist finally shot himself in the chest in 1890. He died two days later, aged only 37 years old. During his lifetime, he only sold one painting.

The Museum

The modern Van Gogh Museum houses over 200 paintings, 500 drawings, and hundreds of letters written by the artist.

The first floor of the foundation features many of the Dutch artists’ paintings and relates his personal story through the paintings.

These are placed chronologically and show how the painter evolved from landscape paintings to his later tortured work.

The museum reflects some of the investigations carried out on some of van Gogh’s pieces of art and other paintings that were wrongly attributed to him on the second floor.

On the third and last floor is a collection of 19th-century paintings, where visitors can see how other contemporary artists related to van Gogh’s work.

Skip The Lines

The Van Gogh Museum is the second most visited museum in Amsterdam, so the queues that form to get in are endless, especially on public holidays. To avoid them, we recommend discovering the museum first thing in the morning or last thing in the afternoon. There is also a faster line for tourists with the I Amsterdam City Card.

Not To Be Missed

Although we know that Van Gogh's paintings are not everyone's cup of tea, admiring his (almost complete) collection and being able to relate it to the stages of his life changes the view that many people have of the Dutch painter.

If you don't want to miss any detail of the Van Gogh Museum in Amsterdam, we recommend you book our guided tour, which also includes preferential access:

• Van Gogh Museum Guided Tour

If you choose to go on your own, at the entrance to the museum you can pick up a brochure in English, where you'll find plenty of interesting details about the life of Van Gogh and thus be able to better understand his paintings.

You can also buy a Van Gogh Museum ticket, which is included with a walk along Amsterdam's canals, so you can enjoy two of the city's must-see activities:

• Van Gogh Ticket + Canal Cruise

Finally, if you're interested in expressionist painting, we recommend you visit other galleries of expressionist artists, such as the Munch Museum in Oslo.