SUNFLOWERS

A virtual exhibition of Vincent Van Gogh's 11 portraits of sunflowers…

I will admit upfront that, going into this feature, I had scarcely a passing knowledge of Van Gogh, the artist who cut off his own ear, who was famous for painting Sunflowers. One of the many things that I was unaware of was the fact that he had painted not just one, but eleven such portraits.

Two of these have been lost to the ages, at least one is held by a private collector and the others are situated in museums. For the most part, this feature focuses on the ones on display in London, Amsterdam, Tokyo, Munich and Philadelphia.

 This is not a dry lecture. The film does a good job of bringing Van Gogh to life, with a good lookalike giving us a physical representation of the artist. On top of that, we have narrations of letters that Van Gogh sent to his brother and sister, where he enthuses about embarking on the paintings, teasing details of each.

Four of the paintings were done in Paris in 1887 (Sunflowers lying on a table), then he moved to Arles where he painted another seven (sunflowers arranged in a vase). They are seen to be a huge departure from the works he was known for up to that point - dark muted coloured portraits of working class life.

 The feature also puts into perspective his subject matter - the sunflowers themselves, which had only been introduced to Europe a few years before and were not as everyday  a flower as they are seen today. It's also interesting to note that Van Gogh was influenced in his two-dimensional technique by Japanese art.

The Sunflower paintings also represent a transitioning period in the development of Van Gogh's painting style. Whereas Vincent would require his subject to be present in front of him, for him to paint, his compatriot Gaugin tended to paint from memory (the start of abstract painting). Van Gogh tries something akin to this when he duplicates the painting which is now housed in London, with two variants.

And then there are the paintings themselves. The feature goes into nice detail about each one, giving in-depth closeups of each so you can see the brush strokes. The advantage of hi-definition television now is that the viewer can examine these works so much closer than ever before. Up very close, Van Gogh's style seems almost slap-dash in the way the paint has been applied but it does all come together. There is also an unevenness with the thickness of the paint as its applied, so although the portrait themselves are a 2D representation the actual painting has thickness and texture to it.

 THE VERDICT

This feature manages to make a convincing argument for why these paintings are both so famous and valuable (the last time one of them was sold, it fetched over 25Million pounds). It also provides a lot of perspective as to their origin, using Van Gogh's own words to provide a sense of time and place. As engaging as it is however, your mileage will vary depending on how interested or curious you are iin the subject matter.

7 out of 10 MikeOutWest

Sunflowers is released in cinemas across the UK from 8 June, including Curzon, Everyman, Odeon, Picturehouse, Showcase, Vue and independent cinemas. Find your nearest cinema at exhibitiononscreen.com