Van Gogh Painting Uncovered with X-Ray Vision

It’s rare that we discover new works of art from 19th century masters - but it seems that the late Dutch master Vincent Van Gogh still has some tricks under his dusty sleeve.

By Kathryn Hawkins. Posted on August 03 2008

It’s rare that we discover new works of art from 19th century masters - but it seems that the late Dutch master Vincent Van Gogh still has some tricks under his dusty sleeve.

Art historians had long suspected there was something fishy about one of Van Gogh’s well-known paintings, “Patch of Grass.” And recently, a team of researchers decided to get to the bottom of it - literally.

Using a narrowly focused x-ray beam that can determine the chemical makeup of different layers of paint, a group of researchers from the Netherlands’ Delf University of Technology carefully studied the painting, and came to a surprising conclusion: Beneath “Patch of Grass” was a fully-formed earlier painting of a peasant woman. Thanks to the advanced laser technology, art afiscionados are now able to see the painting in detail without damaging the overlying work - NPR has a video and more details on the complicated procedure the researchers used to uncover the mysterious painting.

Koen Janssens, a chemistry professor at the University of Antwerp who helped lead the examination, believes that Van Gogh painted over about a third of all his works - which means the sneaky Dutch artist may be bringing us new works for quite some time to come.

Filed under: Arts and Culture, General Interest, History,

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