At TEFAF Maastricht, the Van Gogh Museum acquired Virginie Demont-Breton’s L’homme est en mer, a painting from 1887–88 that now counts as only the third painting by a woman in the institution’s collection, according to Artnet News. As reported by senior editor Kate Brown, the painting of a woman looking longingly while holding an infant—presumably pining for the titular man at sea—was purchased by the Amsterdam museum with public funds dedicated to acquisitions for a price between €500,000 and €1 million ($543,000 and $1.1 million). The sale on TEFAF’s opening day was brokered by Gallery 19C from Dallas-Forth Worth, where the work had been in a private collection for 20 years. Related Articles London's Natural History Museum Braces for Pokémon Pop-Up After Tickets Sell Out Van Gogh Museum Says It May Close If Dutch Government Doesn't Contribute More Money “Van Gogh had seen Demont-Breton’s painting, which was made in between 1887 and 1889, reproduced in black and white in a magazine about French salon paintings and he was so inspired by it that he copied it,” according to Artnet. “It is one of the only paintings by a woman artist that he is known to have emulated.” About the work, Lisa Smit, the Van Gogh Museum’s curator of paintings, said, “Van Gogh was a big fan of the work of Demont-Breton’s father, Jules Breton. He would have seen a lot of sentiment in this work. It is heartfelt, it is truthful. You can immediately feel for the figure. It is a depiction of motherhood that is not idyllic.” Demont-Breton’s L’homme est en mer previously sold at Christie’s in 2000 for a price of $99,500. In an essay accompanying the lot at the time, Christie’s wrote, “While her subject matter ranged from religious compositions, genre scenes and landscapes, she had a particular penchant for her heartfelt depictions of family life.”
