Vincent van Gogh's iconic painting 'The Starry Night' out for special analysis at MoMA

‘The Starry Night’ painting created by Dutch Post-Impressionist painter Vincent van Gogh was recently sent for a special analysis at the Museum of Modern Art (MoMA). The spectacular oil-on-canvas painting was created back in 1889 and has been gracing the fifth floor of the New York Museum. However, late on Friday, MoMA announced that the painting was recently analysed by a senior paintings conservator to confirm that all paint layers are stable and intact.

The disclosure comes as the Museum said that they would be relocating the painting to a new location post analysis. According to the current infrastructure plan of the museum, Gogh’s painting sits at the fifth floor of the museum building- in section housing collections from 1880s till 1940s. Notably, the alteration in the painting’s location comes as a part of MoMA’s Fall reveal 2021 which is an initiative to coalesce paintings in different combinations twice a year.

“The painting’s new home in Gallery 502 is dedicated to a 1931 bequest of over 150 works from Lillie P. Bliss, one of three intrepid women who founded MoMA. An advocate for modern art, Bliss had sought out the work of mostly late-nineteenth-century French artists whose radical approaches to color, space, and form were controversial at the time,” the American museum revealed.

Gogh created the painting while at a mental asylum

Vincent Van Gogh painted 'The Starry Night' in June 1889 while recovering from a mental illness and his ear amputation. "Inspired by the view from his window at the Saint-Paul-de-Mausole asylum in Saint-Rémy, in southern France, where the artist spent twelve months in 1889–90 seeking reprieve from his mental illnesses, The Starry Night (made in mid-June) is both an exercise in observation and a clear departure from it," according to a description by MoMA. 

Image: Twitter/@VanGoghArtist, Instagram/@themuseumofmodernart