The National Gallery bought its first Vincent van Gogh painting, View of Paris, for £602,000 (€904,000) at a Sotheby's auction in London this week.
The estimate on the oil painting was £300,000 to £400,000, and the gallery feels that it acquired the painting for a reasonable price.
Van Gogh painted Vue de Paris aux environs de Montmartre(45.6cm x 38.5cm) in summer 1886, a few months after he moved, aged 33, to Paris to live with his brother Theo, an art dealer and gallery manager.
One of four such paintings, it is of the view of rooftops from their shared apartment at 54 rue Lepic near the Montmartre. View of Pariswas in a private collection since 1926.
The National Gallery's collection of impressionist and post-impressionist paintings is small but growing, and this is a very significant addition to it. Last November the gallery bought Le Déjeuner, by Pierre Bonnard at Christie's in New York for $2,704,000 (€2,074,000), which was within its estimate.
The "hammer price" (including the premium and VAT) of £602,000 for a van Gogh oil painting seems conservative, especially in view of the fact that Irish art is currently almost reaching that level. Van Gogh paintings have sold for considerably more, and the bidding might have gone higher, especially as auctions such as this can involve bidding against private collectors. As well as relying on its own conservation and curatorial departments, the gallery sought external views and expertise, as is its usual practice, before bidding on the painting. National Gallery director Raymond Keaveney described the acquisition as "an important and delightful addition to the gallery's collection".
The gallery expects to have possession of the painting, which is said to be in a pristine condition, in a couple of weeks. It will be on public display by the end of February or early March.
It was auctioned on Tuesday in Sotheby's sale of Impressionist and Modern Art, which was much hyped and which sold paintings for a total of £95 million, establishing six new auction records.
The Irish gallery has also recently acquired A Female Nude Reclining on a Chaise Longue(c1752) by Francois Boucher, a preparatory study for his iconic The Blond Odalisque.