Still life, plate with bread

This plate of bread spent decades inside the Van Gogh family's own collection, counted as Vincent's work from his Paris years, around 1887. It still carries a number from the first full catalogue of his paintings, published in 1928: F253a. The Van Gogh Museum's own record now gives the maker as unknown. That change is less dramatic than it sounds. Vincent shared a flat in Montmartre with his brother Theo, who sold pictures for a living, and painters in that circle swapped canvases among themselves, so other people's work travelled with the family for generations. A companion still life of wine, bread and cheese hangs in the same collection and has lost Vincent's name in the same way. The pictures went from Theo's widow Jo to their son, then in 1962 to the Vincent van Gogh Foundation, which placed them on long-term loan in Amsterdam, where this one is still filed under its old catalogue number.