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Indepth Arts News: "Masterpieces by Odilon Redon and Emile Bernard" 2009-04-10 until 2009-09-12 van Gogh Museum Amsterdam, , NL
The collector
Bonger was one of the first collectors in the Netherlands to catch on to the French avant-garde art of his time. He first discovered it in Paris in the 1880s, thanks to his friend and later brother-in-law Theo van Gogh. Initially he collected work by Paul Cézanne, Paul Gauguin and Vincent van Gogh, but gradually his interest turned increasingly to the more symbolist work of Odilon Redon and Emile Bernard -- art that did not stem from reality but originated in the imagination. Bonger maintained an intensive correspondence with Redon and Bernard and built up friendly ties. He also supported them during difficult periods in their career and from 1893 onwards collected their work on a large scale. As a result of this long-standing friendship with the two artists he was able to acquire works from different periods and executed in various techniques: paintings, prints and drawings, but also tapestries and special panels designed specifically for him as interior decoration for his house.
Emile Bernard and Andries Bonger
Bonger first met Bernard in 1890, at the funeral of their mutual friend Vincent van Gogh. He valued the modern, decorative work of the young artist, and following a period of animated correspondence, Bonger started to buy Bernard's work on a large scale. Even when Bernard left for the Middle East in 1893 on a religious quest that was to last for a year the two stayed in contact via letters, with Bonger regularly purchasing work that Bernard sent him. Bonger had a clear preference for Bernard's modern work. Tensions surfaced between the two as Bernard gradually turned away from this style and from around 1900 started to paint in an increasingly realistic and traditional manner. Bonger succeeded in averting a break by commissioning decorative work, but from 1908 onwards he bought few if any works from Bernard. The two did however continue to correspond with one another until Bonger's death in 1936.
Odilon Redon and Andries Bonger
In 1891 Bonger visited Redon's Paris studio along with Bernard. Bonger admired the way in which Redon translated subjects from the imagination, the Bible and literature into a new, distinctive visual language. In 1893 Bonger, himself a passionate lover of literature, acquired his first two prints by this symbolist. As the years went by, he developed into the Netherlands' most important collector of Redon's work -- initially of the artist's drawings and prints, but later also of his paintings and his decorative works. For Redon, Bonger was not only an active collector, but also a good friend, patron, advisor and promoter. It was Bonger who pressed Redon into publishing his memoirs, which the artist dedicated to him.
Andries Bonger and the Van Gogh family
From 1879 to 1892 Bonger worked as the youngest clerk at a trading company in Paris. In 1881 he became friends with Theo van Gogh, an art dealer in the French capital. It was Theo who stimulated Bonger's interest in modern art. Together they would visit various exhibitions and sit and discuss art for hours on end. Bonger also conducted long conversations on literature and art with Theo's brother Vincent, who lived in Paris from 1886 to 1888. In 1889 Theo married Bonger's sister Johanna (Jo), so that the friends even became family. When he left Paris in 1892 Bonger was one of the first to own work by Van Gogh, having seven paintings in his possession.
Publication
Odilon Redon and Emile Bernard: Masterpieces from the Andries Bonger collection by Fred Leeman with assistance from Fleur Roos Rosa de Carvalho. This book describes how Bonger assembled his collection and groups together all the works contained in the original collection for the first time. Van Gogh Museum / Waanders Publishers, 160 pages, 230 illustrations, available in English and Dutch. Price € 29.95 (hardcover). Available in the Van Gogh Museum's museum shop, via www.vangoghmuseumshop.com and in bookshops.
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From 10 April to 20 September 2009 the exhibition Odilon Redon and Emile Bernard: Masterpieces from the Andries Bonger collection will be on show in the Van Gogh Museum. Over the period 1892 to 1908 the Amsterdam insurance banker Andries Bonger (1861-1936) assembled a collection of some 250 works of art, many of which were by his friends Odilon Redon (1840-1916) and Emile Bernard (1868-1941). A large part of his painstakingly assembled collection of modern French art was acquired in 1996 by the Dutch State and housed in the Van Gogh Museum. Eighty works, including paintings, drawings, pastels, prints and pieces of embroidery by Redon and Bernard, offer an insight into the progressive taste of Andries Bonger. The exhibition, the design of which evokes the atmosphere of the Bonger’s reception rooms, is augmented by letters, photographs, documents and several key works on loan, including paintings by Paul Cézanne and Vincent van Gogh. These works originally also formed part of Andries Bonger's collection. The exhibition also devotes attention to the extensive technical research conducted into the collection. A book of the same name on the complete collection of Andries Bonger will be published to coincide with the exhibition.
