This was a 2-hour online tour of the Van Gogh Museum in Amsterdam, detailing Van Gogh’s life as an artist – starting when he was 26 and ending when he died at the age of 37. I attended this virtual event as part of my Art Award Silver with my Dad on 2nd January 2021.

The art form included were the main forms used by Van Gogh, starting with watercolors and quickly changing to oil paints.

I have never been to an event focusing on the life of a particular artist, so I thought it was a very informative and fun experience and I am glad I am enrolled for another event of this kind later this month.

I would highly recommend this event to others; however, I would have liked to visit the museum itself, had it not been closed due to Coronavirus and I will try to visit in the future!

I learnt so much from this experience, and I especially enjoyed learning about how Van Gogh’s art style changed so dramatically through different points of his life. I also learned how he was lonely and not appreciated by other artists during his life, and so I found a new sense of respect for him. Also, he started painting at the age of 26, which shows that it’s never too late to learn a new skill. It was also very interesting that he did his works in series, often of the same subject, or very similar ones. These series varied in size, and so multiple galleries all over the world are displaying very similar works.

I loved this event as a whole, but I would have liked to have seen more footage of the museum, as I believe that the framing, scale and context of the pieces adds to the experience, but I understand that this was not possible during current times.