It’s not often that a new artwork is added to the catalog of an artist who’s been dead for well over a century, but that’s just what happened today, as a recently rediscovered drawing was formally attributed to Vincent van Gogh.
Completed with pencil on paper in 1882, while the Dutch master was living in The Hague, the drawing depicts an enervated old man seated with his head in his hands. It’s thought to be a preliminary study for Van Gogh’s drawing Worn out, completed the same year.
The news of the discovery and attribution was announced in a press conference held by the Van Gogh Museum in Amsterdam, where the artwork now is on public display for the first time.
“It’s quite rare for a new work to be attributed to Van Gogh,” the institution’s director, Emilie Gordenker, said in a statement. “We’re proud to be able to share this early drawing and its story with our visitors.”
