Touchy-feely with Van Gogh

[Photo provided to China Daily]

The U-shaped exhibition hall, about 8 meters high, reveals the artist's life through various stages－h(huán)is early life; Van Gogh as an emerging artist in the Netherlands, Antwerp and Paris; his time in Arles in the south of France; the period of his illness; and the artist's legacy and relevance after his death in 1890.

Apart from showing high-resolution images of Van Gogh's works from the museum's collection, it also presents quotations from Van Gogh's letters, displays lifelike 3-D reproductions of original works and re-creations of some of the spaces the artist used－h(huán)is bedroom in Arles, which is featured in his world-famous painting The Bedroom; the cafe in Paris that he often visited to meet his artist friends; and his work studio.

Visitors can also sit on the bed in the artist's bedroom, appreciate Van Gogh's self-portraits by sitting on a pile of wheat straw and feel the genius' brush strokes by touching a several-meter-high sculpture that is an amplified copy of the peasant in his painting The Harvest.

They can also use their fingers to paint on a screen with the colors and swirling strokes Van Gogh employed in his works like Starry Night and Sunflowers.

Explaining why they developed the show, Rene van Blerk, senior curator of education with the Van Gogh Museum, says: "We don't have enough space in our museum for so many interactive activities to enhance the stories of the artist's life."