Silver Pours adds a gorgeous copper-cored art coin, featuring Vincent van Gogh’s 1888 work, Café Terrace at Night

An absolute giant in the world of fine art, Vincent van Gogh had a unique grasp of colour and style that has remained unmatched. A Dutch Post-Impressionist painter, he produced an expansive body of works, including portraits, landscapes and still life, especially of cypresses, wheat fields and sunflowers. In just over a decade, he produced more than 2,100 artworks, including 860 oil paintings and more than 1,300 watercolours, drawings, sketches and prints. A troubled figure, he took his own life in 1890, coming at the end of his most prolific two-year period.

One of those was Café Terrace at Night, painted in 1888 after he had moved to Arles, in Provence. Vincent was once quoted as saying, “I often think that the night is more alive and more richly coloured than the day”, and that ethos is exemplified in this painting. A September evening café scene, with gaslight illumination, exhibits his extraordinary grasp of colour. It was obviously a favourite of his, as he wrote to his sister, Wil, “Here you have a night picture without black, with nothing but beautiful blue and violet and green, and in these surroundings the lighted square is colored pale sulfur, lemon green.”” The painting, his first to have a starry night, currently resides in the Kröller-Müller Museum in Otterlo, Netherlands.

On the coin’s reverse face is a reproduction of the painting, which is beautifully textured to match Van Gogh’s iconic style, The colouring looks vibrant, and well graduated. It’s cropped to suit the round coin, of course, but importantly, the essence remains, and it loses very little in the transition. The obverse is superb, and an original work, but entirely in keeping with the artist’s style. Van Gogh was a prolific self-portrait painter, producing over 35 of them in the last few years of his life, and one of them, ‘Self-Portrait with Grey Felt Hat’, painted in late 1887, has him wearing almost identical attire. Here, however, he is placed in the café he made his subject. Heavy texture is employed to fine effect, again.

As somewhat of a Philistine when it comes to fine art, you should take my opinion with a massive dose of salt, but I think this one is outstanding. A fine homage to a beloved, and immensely regarded artist. It’s a big old beast, thanks to utilising that silver over copper technique pioneered by Precious Metal Collectors. Here, two ounces of fine silver are laid over almost a kilo of copper, enabling this relatively affordable coin to hit a 120 mm diameter, and be thick, with defined texturing. I’ve had a couple of this type in hand, and they’re mightily impressive. This one looks to be equally so. Available to order now, kudos to Mint of MK and Silver Pours for this one.

GALLERY

To note, this is actually the second coin in this series, and the first one, released in August, was equally outstanding. That one depicts Van Gogh’s most iconic work, Starry Night, and also has tons of texturing, vibrant colour, and a custom obverse of the artist. The specs are exactly the same. The textured effect on the reverse face is brilliant.