Self-portrait

Van Gogh made about 27 portraits of himself during his two years in Paris, and the reason was partly plain economy: he had no money to pay models, and his own face was always there. This one dates from 1887, oil brushed onto a piece of cardboard, the artist in a brown jacket and grey hat, worked in the broken, separated strokes he had picked up in the city. He gave it to a friend, Andries Bonger, who later became his brother Theo's brother-in-law. Through the Bonger family it eventually reached the Rijksmuseum, given by Bonger's widow in 1936.