Self-Portrait with a Straw Hat — About This Work
Vincent van Gogh, 1887
About the Work
During his two years in Paris, Van Gogh made more than twenty self-portraits. With little money for models but determined to improve as a figure painter, he repeatedly used his own reflection. The self-portrait became both a practical solution and a testing ground for a rapidly changing style.
Painted in 1887, Self-Portrait with a Straw Hat belongs to the period in which Paris transformed Van Gogh's approach to colour and brushwork. His encounters with Impressionism and the newer Neo-Impressionist painting of artists such as Georges Seurat and Paul Signac encouraged a lighter palette, more broken touches of paint and a stronger interest in complementary colour. The Metropolitan Museum of Art specifically notes the work's awareness of Neo-Impressionist technique and colour theory.
The canvas also makes that transformation unusually tangible. On its reverse is The Potato Peeler, a darker peasant study painted in Nuenen in 1885. The two sides place Van Gogh's earlier Dutch manner back-to-back with the brighter, more experimental painting he developed in Paris only two years later.
The Work
Artist: Vincent van Gogh
Title: Self-Portrait with a Straw Hat
Date: 1887
Medium: Oil on canvas
Recorded dimensions: 40.6 cm high × 31.8 cm wide
Collection: The Metropolitan Museum of Art, New York
Object number: 67.187.70a
Print & Presentation
Palatine presentation: 40 × 50 cm portrait frame.
The complete artwork is reproduced at approximately its recorded 31.8 × 40.6 cm dimensions, without cropping or distortion. The surrounding white presentation area is incorporated into the print rather than added as a separate mount.
Frame finishes: Black, White or Natural.
Paper & glazing: Enhanced Matte + Perspex; Enhanced Matte + Moth-Eye.
Why Original Scale?
Most art-print shops offer the same image in a choice of Small, Medium and Large sizes. We take a different approach. For each edition, we begin with the recorded dimensions of the original work and reproduce the complete image at that scale, preserving its proportions and avoiding enlargement, reduction, cropping or distortion.
Source: The Metropolitan Museum of Art, New York. Digital image: Wikimedia Commons, Public Domain.
Care: Display in a dry interior away from prolonged direct sunlight and sources of moisture.
Notes from Palatine
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Palatine Editions · Original Scale Editions · palatineeditions.com