Seattle Art Museum houses the life of Van Gogh

A legend has come to Seattle and taken up residence in the Seattle Art Museum (SAM). The spirit of Vincent van Gogh inhabits the museum where the art that whispers of his life will be displayed until September 12.

This widely hyped exhibit titled "Van Gogh to Mondrian: Modern Art from the Kroller-Muller Museum," is now on display at the SAM.

The work of van Gogh may be the main attraction, but the real star of the show is behind the scenes. This is Helene Kroller-Muller, founder of the Kroller-Muller Museum. Located in the Netherlands, the museum houses one of the largest van Gogh collections in the world.

In general, art critics everywhere would applaud Kroller-Muller's taste in artists. The exhibit features a dozen van Gogh paintings and 10 original drawings, as well as assorted paintings by pioneers of pointillism, Georges Seurat and Paul Signac. Also on display are cubist works by Picasso and Juan Gris. A Diego Rivera still-life of a liquor bottle from the artist's short-lived cubist period is thrown in for good measure.

Van Gogh's personal struggles as an epileptic add a depth to his art -- located at the heart of the exhibit -- giving him a legacy that few artistic biographies can compare to. His work is appealing not only for its stunning visual capacities but for what it reveals about the way van Gogh lived his life.

One of the exhibit's most striking pieces is van Gogh's "Despairing Old Man," a depiction of a frail-looking man crouching in a chair with his head buried in his hands. Perhaps reminiscent of how van Gogh felt during much of his life, the painting was ironically presented to Helene Kroller-Muller by her husband on the night of their 25th wedding anniversary.

Though the paintings are relatively few in number and leave the viewer wishing to see more, the exhibit displays works from every period of van Gogh's career.

Sadly, the exhibit seems to lose focus when the van Gogh paintings come to an end. After seeing the vivacity of van Gogh's brushstrokes and the boldness of his colors, the inclusion of symbolist painters Bart van der Leck and even exhibit headliner Piet Mondrian seem like little more than an afterthought.

Walking through the exhibit, one literally turns a corner at the end of the van Gogh paintings into a world politically and artistically devolved from the era van Gogh worked in. Mondrian's monochromatic "Composition in Line," despite being described by its owner as having a "Christmas feel," seems less energetic than the masterpieces van Gogh painted.

Especially memorable is van Gogh's 1887 "Self-Portrait," composed of long, haphazard brushstrokes that give the feeling that Van Gogh might melt into the swirling, chaotic background. Here, van Gogh depicted his own likeness staring off into space, seeing something the viewer cannot. It is this small, introspective look at van Gogh, as he seems to glimpse where his life is going, that makes the exhibit worth seeing.