PARIS (AP) – A rare painting by Dutch Impressionist master Vincent van Gogh of a street scene in Paris’s Montmartre district will be shown publicly for the first time before going up for auction next month.
Sotheby’s auction house said the work, painted in 1887, has remained in the same family collection for over 100 years – out of the public eye.
It will be on display in Amsterdam, Hong Kong and Paris next month ahead of an auction that will take place March 25 in the French capital.
“It is an important painting in Vincent van Gogh’s oeuvre because it dates back to when he lived in Paris with his brother Theo,” Etienne Hellman, senior director of Impressionist and Modern Art at Sotheby’s, told the Associated Press.
Van Gogh moved to Paris in 1886 and lived in Montmartre. He left the capital in 1888 for southern France, where he lived until his death in 1890.
“Before that, his paintings are much darker … In Paris, he discovers color,” said Hellman. “Color blows up in the painting.”
“Street scene in Montmartre” shows a windmill called the Pepper Mill, seen from the street under a clear sky, with a man, a woman and a little girl walking in front of the wooden palisades that surround the place.
“Paris marks this period when … the major Impressionists influenced his work,” Hellman said.
Sotheby’s said the painting has previously been published in seven catalogs, but has never been exhibited.
Claudia Mercier, auctioneer of the Mirabaud Mercier house, said: “It is also an important painting because very few are still in private hands … especially from that period, most are now in museums.”
Sotheby’s has estimated the value of the painting to be between 5 and 8 million euros (between 6.1 and 9.8 million dollars). It that did not reveal the identity of the owner.
It can be seen in Amsterdam on March 1-3, Hong-King on March 9-12 and Paris on March 16-23.
The pepper mill was destroyed during the construction of an avenue in 1911, but two similar windmills are still present on Montmartre hill.