Portrait of Dr Gachet by Van Gogh: Foxglove, Melancholy and a Record

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The doctor who watched over Van Gogh

Dr Paul-Ferdinand Gachet was a physician in Auvers-sur-Oise with a strong interest in art. He was a friend of painters such as Pissarro and Cézanne and an amateur etcher himself. When Van Gogh left the asylum in Saint-Rémy in May 1890, Theo arranged for Gachet to keep an eye on him in Auvers.

Van Gogh painted the doctor in early June 1890, only weeks after they met. He told Theo that he had found in Gachet something like a brother, so alike were they physically and morally. He also worried that the doctor seemed as ill and anxious as he was.

This is the first of two versions. The second, painted shortly afterwards, is in the Musée d’Orsay in Paris.

His head rests heavily on his hand

Dr Gachet’s face in a white cap, head resting on his right fist — Head on hand: a traditional pose of melancholy.

Gachet leans on a red table, his head propped on his right fist. The pose is a traditional sign of melancholy, familiar from centuries of European art. His white cap is pushed back, and his face is painted in pale yellows and pinks with green shadows.

The eyes are pale blue and slightly unfocused, looking past the viewer. The mouth turns down. Van Gogh wrote to Gauguin that he wanted to give the portrait the heartbroken expression of their time, so the sadness is deliberate rather than accidental.

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Foxglove and two yellow novels

Purple foxglove in a glass beside two yellow books on a red table — Foxglove marks the doctor; the novels show his tastes.

On the table lie two yellow books and a glass with sprigs of purple foxglove. The titles can be read: Germinie Lacerteux and Manette Salomon, novels by the brothers Edmond and Jules de Goncourt. Both are stories of modern life in Paris, and Van Gogh admired them.

Foxglove, or digitalis, was used in medicine, especially for heart conditions. Its presence identifies the sitter as a doctor without needing a title. The books, in turn, point to his modern, literary tastes. Together they work like attributes in an older portrait, telling us who this man is.

Everything else is blue

Deep blue coat with swirling strokes and pale green buttons — The coat is painted in curving blue strokes.

Gachet’s coat is a deep blue, painted with strokes that curve and swirl around the body. Its pale green buttons stand out like small moons. Behind him, a band of rolling blue hills meets a lighter blue sky made of wavy dashes.

Rolling blue hills under a pale blue sky of wavy strokes — Blue hills and sky surround the figure.

The blues press in from every side, leaving the face, hand, table and books as the only warm areas. That arrangement guides the eye straight to what matters: the face resting on the hand and the objects beside it.

A record price and a lost trail

For most of the twentieth century this first version passed through German and American collections. In May 1990, a century after it was painted, it sold at auction in New York for 82.5 million dollars, then the highest price ever paid for a painting.

The buyer was the Japanese businessman Ryoei Saito. After his death in 1996 the painting was sold privately, and its current owner has not been made public. It is one of the most famous Van Gogh paintings that the public cannot see.

Questions about Portrait of Dr Gachet

Who was Dr Gachet?

Paul-Ferdinand Gachet, a doctor in Auvers-sur-Oise who cared for Van Gogh in the last months of his life and was a friend of many Impressionist painters.

Why is he holding his head?

The head-on-hand pose is a traditional image of melancholy. Van Gogh wanted the portrait to express sadness.

What is the plant on the table?

Foxglove (digitalis), a plant used in medicine, which marks him as a physician.

Where is the painting now?

This first version is in a private collection. The second version is in the Musée d’Orsay, Paris.

Sources and image credit

Public-domain reproduction of Portrait of Dr Gachet (first version, 1890), via Wikimedia Commons. The original is in a private collection and the available image is a photographic reproduction. Detail images are crops of the same image; no reconstruction or upscaling.