Vincent van Gogh

(probably) Anna Cornelia van Gogh-Carbentus, Nuenen/Breda (mother of the artist)

Janus Schrauwen, Breda (acquired from the above in 1888)

Jan C. Couvreur, Breda (acquired from the above on August 14, 1902)

Kees Mouwen Jr. & Willem van Bakel, Breda (acquired from the above in 1902-03)

Sebald Rudolf Steinmetz, Amsterdam

R. Th. Steinmetz, Ellecom, Netherlands (by descent from the above)

R. Steinmetz, The Hague (by descent from the above by 1969)

Private Collection, Germany (by descent from the above and sold: Sotheby's Parke Bernet, London, June 30, 1976, lot 95)

Private Collection, New York (acquired at the above sale)

Thence by descent to the present owner

Rotterdam, Kunstzalen, Oldenzeel, Vincent Van Gogh, 1903, no. 70

Rotterdam, Kunstzalen, Oldenzeel, Vincent Van Gogh, 1904, no. 49

Amsterdam, Kunsthandel E. J. Van Wisselingh, Vincent Van Gogh: Quelques Oeuvres de l'Epoque 1881-86, provenant de collections particulières néerlandaises, 1956, no. 5 (titled Pêcheurs de Scheveningue assis sur un banc)

Amsterdam, Kunsthandel E. J. Van Wisselingh, Vincent Van Gogh: aquarelles et dessins de l'époque 1881-85 provenant de collections particulières néerlandaises, 1961, no. 15, illustrated in the catalogue (titled Pêcheurs de Schevinggue assis sur un banc)

Jacob Baart de la Faille, Vincent Van Gogh, Paris & Brussels, 1928, vol. III, no. F951, catalogued p. 30; vol. IV, no. F951, illustrated pl. XXVII (titled Pêcheurs de Scheveningue assis sur un banc)

Walther Vanbeselaere, De Hollandasche periode (1880-85) in het werk van Vincent Van Gogh (1853-1890), Antwerp, 1937, mentioned pp. 85, 162 & 408

Catalogue of 271 Works by Vincent van Gogh Belonging to the Collection of the State Museum Kröller-Müller, Otterlo, 1956, discussed p. 9

Jacob Baart de la Faille, The Works of Vincent Van Gogh, Amsterdam, 1970, no. F951, illustrated p. 355

Jan Hulsker, The Complete Van Gogh, Paintings, Drawings, Sketches, New York, 1980, no. 197, illustrated p. 53 (titled Bench with Four Persons (and Baby))

Van Gogh en den Haag (exhibition catalogue), Haags Historisch Museum, The Hague, 1990, illustrated p. 138 (titled Bank mit vier personen en een baby)

Jacob Baart de la Faille, Vincent Van Gogh, The Complete Works on Paper, Catalogue Raisonné, San Francisco, 1992, vol. I, no. 951, catalogued p. 245; vol. II, illustrated pl. XXVII

Jan Hulsker, The New Complete Van Gogh, Paintings, Drawings, Sketches, 1996, no. 197, illustrated p. 53 (titled Bench with Four Persons (and Baby))

Sjraar van Heugten, Vincent Van Gogh, Drawings, The Early Years 1880-1883, Amsterdam & London, 1996, vol. I, illustrated p. 126 (titled Four People Sitting on a Bench)

Leo Jansen, Hans Luijten & Nienke Bakker, Vincent van Gogh, The Letters, The Complete Illustrated and Annotated Edition, Volume 2: The Hague, 1881-1883, London, 2009, illustrated pp. 151 & 153-54

During the time Van Gogh spent in The Hague between 1881-1883 he was both inspired and compelled to take the working men and women around him as his subjects, producing a series of acutely-observed works documenting their daily lives. Executed in 1882, People Sitting on a Bench in Bezuidenhout, The Hague is a delicate and evocative example of his work from this period and the largest and most complex of four related studies that show the same bench and tree with various arrangements of figures beneath. Van Gogh included two versions of the scene in a letter to his brother Theo on September 11, 1882 explaining: “I drew the bench after a larger watercolour [the present work] that I'm working on in which the tones are deeper ...” (quoted in L. Jansen, H. Luijten & N. Bakker, op. cit., p. 150). 

Responding to an earlier suggestion of Theo’s, he goes on to propose that the engaging subject and his use of watercolor might prove more appealing to potential buyers. The present work certainly reveals the artist’s growing facility in the medium of watercolor with the figures on the bench rendered in fluid strokes of paint heightened by the delicate details of the pipe and glasses of the furthest figure. Equally the subject, capturing a brief moment of leisure, illustrates the artist’s enthusiasm for these scenes, as he explained later in the same letter: “I love it so much, sketching on the street, and, as I wrote in my last letter, I’m determined to achieve a certain standard in it.… I'm full of new pleasure in things because I have fresh hope of myself being able to make something with some soul in it” (quoted in ibid., pp. 150-51).