After Van Gogh Alive received glowing reviews Culture Editor Nadia Sommella was disappointed when the exhibition didn’t live up to her expectations and provides a different, more critical take
For an experience titled Van Gogh Alive, the focus was overwhelmingly pointed towards the artist’s untimely death, even ending with a gunshot noise. This untasteful resolution epitomises the gimmicky feeling that permeated the whole exhibition.
Having received a glowing review by a fellow Redbrick Culture writer, I was excited to visit the travelling exhibition that has found its way to Birmingham’s Hippodrome. All I’d seen was positive advertising and first-person accounts, so when I left the theatre feeling not only disappointed, but somewhat cheated, it felt like an emperor’s new clothes moment – what was I missing?
The ‘exhibition’ or ‘experience’ boasted the use of new technology to show you the work of Vincent Van Gogh, arguably the world’s most famous artist, in a whole new way – immersive, multi-sensory, unforgettable. It wasn’t cheap either, at £15 for a standard (weekday only) ticket, discounted by a whole £1.50 if you are a student. Considering schemes like the Tate Collective, through which I can see a multitude of first-class exhibitions for only £5 each, this seems steep, but acceptable if delivering the life-changing experience it seemed to promise.
What I was met with was a glorified PowerPoint slideshow of reproduced images, accompanied by a pleasant Spotify playlist of classical music
We were then ushered through into the main room for the event we had all been waiting for. I remained excited. The first room was just an introduction, this was the real event and I hoped it would live up to expectation. For the next hour (give or take) the large towering screens are plastered with projections of Van Gogh’s artworks, roughly in order of creation, occasionally presented with quotes by the artist himself, taken entirely out of context.
I can admit that the spectacle itself was beautiful. However, the artworks, blown up and cropped to fit the various screens, lost all sense of scale. They moved so quickly, flashing before you, that you barely have time to take it in before the next one appears. Any idea of composition or the concept of the painting as a whole artwork disappeared as they were zoomed in so far, they became merely pretty patterns to marvel at.
The last straw for me came with the use of animation. Elements of the artworks came and disappeared, birds flew across the screen and petals fell from branches. Whilst an interesting use of technology, it completely ignored the artist’s own intentions and the qualities of painting as a medium. In the age of fleeting attention spans, do painting’s have to move to be worthy of looking at?
This was an exhibition for the Instagram generation, and aptly enough you would have been hard-pressed to find someone who did not have their phone out
To me, this was an exhibition for the Instagram generation, and aptly enough you would have been hard-pressed to find someone who did not have their phone out. Long gone is the quiet contemplation of an artwork, instead we are expected to take in a lifetime of work within an hour, all the while our senses are being overwhelmed with light, noise and motion. It was an exhibition without any artworks. It was culture that was pre-digested and presented for us on screens in bite-size pieces.
The one redeeming aspect was the way in which the experience utilised music. The score was mesmerising, and it was fascinating to see how the organisers had paired different music with different artworks. However, even the music was used to dictate your mood and interpretation of the works. Dark and moody music was used as the backdrop for artworks produced near the artist’s death, encouraging us to read them as foreshadowing the events that followed.
There was little discussion of actual painterly technique, colour palette or subject matter. The artworks instead seen as if Van Gogh just painted what he felt, with little planning or forethought. Anyone that has read the extensive letters Vincent sent to his brother Theo knows that he did not paint in a frenzy of emotion, but rather every element was carefully and purposefully arranged. Ignoring this is ignoring Van Gogh’s genius. He was not just a mad man that painted some pretty pictures, he was a skilled artist utilising techniques that were before his time.
After the gunshot reverberates through the room and reminds us of the tragic ending to the artist’s story, you are encouraged to pose happily in a recreation of his bedroom. This to me seemed insensitive, or at the very least – bad timing. The whole experience ends by walking through a field of sunflowers, or more aptly put, a small room with several plastic sunflowers and walls made of mirrors. It might as well have been titled the ‘selfie room’. Now I love an artful Instagram as much as the next person, but I don’t see the need to spend £15 to get a cool picture.
If you want a whistle-stop tour of Vincent van Gogh’s artistic output and biography but cannot be bothered for a quick browse of the internet, this is certainly a nice way to satisfy that craving
Perhaps it was the marketing of the Van Gogh Alive that let it down. Whilst experience was an accurate term, exhibition was a stretch. If you want a whistle-stop tour of Vincent van Gogh’s artistic output and biography but cannot be bothered for a quick browse of the internet, this is certainly a nice way to satisfy that craving. The experience is beautiful, and if you can afford it there’s no reason you shouldn’t go. But it is no replacement for the real thing. For standing in front of an artwork, absorbing it fully, observing each tactile brushstroke and knowing that the artist himself touched what is right in front of you.
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