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VAN MEEGEREN (drawing) “Corn, Oil, Cotton” (Graan, olie, katoen)

Van Meegeren was fond of large dimensions, both for his oils and his drawings. Whoever else made drawings of 1 meter 30 by 2 meters (approximately 50 by 80 inch) like this one?

Apart from its large dimensions, this drawing has another gimmick:
Thousands of workers are seen here to pull a soap-bubble occupied by a board of capitalists. The gimmick is that Van Meegeren has depicted himself and his wife Jo in the row of the enslaved workers (see the lower right-hand corner). He pokes fun of the situation: he of all people, who cheated capitalists out of their millions, toils in their service! A typical Van Meegeren joke.

(Click on the image to enlarge the picture and enjoy the details in this huge and elaborate work)

HAN VAN MEEGEREN An Erroneous Accusation

see "Corn, oil, Cotton", lower right-hand corner

Recently Van Meegeren was accused of anti-Semitism. The key for this accusation was the above picture: the capitalists in the soap-bubble were said to be Jewish, and the little figure laying at the right of the bubble was seen as a devil laying on the Bible.
There are, however, no signs that these capitalists are meant to be Jewish (there are no Stars of David or other symbols). And the small figure lying on the book is just blowing up the soap-bubble, he does not represent the devil and there is no Bible as the accuser wanted us to believe.
Moreover, Van Meegeren’s joke, depicting his wife and himself (see J and H in the picture), had eluded the critics.

In short: the accusation lacks grounds and is, moreover, unfair to both Van Meegeren and his still living family in Holland.

H = Han van Meegeren's portrait

J = Jo van Meegeren's portrait

VROLIJK GEZELSCHAP (A Jolly Party)

In the very North of Holland a genuine Va Meegeren was discovered in the jocular style of Van Meegeren in the 1920's. See for instance his "Streetmusicians in Paris" from 1928 or his "Streetmusicians in Roquebrune" from the same time.
The year 1927 had been scratched in the lower left corner which agrees well with Van Megeeren's style in those years.
Oil painting on a wooden panel, 16 x 21 cm.

A Landscape

Van Meegeren lived in the 1920’s for some time in a castle by the name “Binckhorst” near The Hague. He paid his rent by means of this painting (as he often paid his rent and other bills in kind).
The receiver of the painting was not fully satisfied and removed the top of the painting; he found the sky in the upper part of the landscape “too dull”.
In this way the painting got its unusual, but attractive, longitudinal shape.
Had Van Meegeren known this, he certainly would have laughed about it. After all, he spoke of his production in those early years: “It was atrocious. Painting assembly-line pictures that were sold to my surprise… when I looked back at better times, I became sick of nostalgia.”
Nevertheless his early paintings show a straightforward and undemanding charm.

A fine portrait

A portrait of Van Meegeren's second wife, Jo, as an actress [here in colour but often found in black and white as a copper plate printing].

Children in a Puppetshow

These children in a puppetshow were seen at the Dutch version of the English 'Antique Roadshow' called 'Tussen Kunst en Kitsch'. A fine example of the late work of Van Meegeren, painted in 1944, three years before his death.

NUDE with a PAINTER in the BACKGROUND

A fine picture from Van Meegeren's early years. Dated about 1920 and presumably painted in a studio of an art-academy in The Hague.

This picture was recently discovered and added to the OEUVRE LIST of Han van Meegeren's work. This OEUVRE LIST has newly been published and can be obtained by e-mailing the webmaster of this website.

The OEUVRE LIST contains now more than 600 works which the artist made under his own name. This is a far greater number then the twenty-five odd fakes which made him so famous…
Many of these six hundred works are fine works-of-art indeed.

A beach scene

We have seen a similar scene before. Van Meegeren often made more than one version of a picture he loved.