An exhibition pairing Vincent van Gogh and Anselm Kiefer—the first to bring together the works of both artists—will open at the Royal Academy of Arts (RA) in London next summer.
Developed in close collaboration with Kiefer’s studio and the Van Gogh Museum in Amsterdam, Kiefer/ Van Gogh will begin its run at the latter, before opening at the RA's Gabrielle Jungels-Winkler Galleries on 28 June 2025. The list of works is still to be announced.
A spokesperson for the RA says: “Our curators are working closely with Kiefer’s studio, and many of the works will be coming from his studio. This is the first time Kiefer and Van Gogh’s work has been shown together in this way.”
The Van Gogh Museum has organised its exhibition in partnership with the nearby Stedelijk Museum, marking the first time the institutions have mounted a joint show (7 March-9 June). Kiefer’s works in the collection of the Stedelijk, such as Innenraum (1981), will go on show at the Van Gogh Museum, but will not travel to the RA.
“Over Kiefer’s 60-year career, the pioneer of Post-Impressionism has informed the subjects and techniques of his monumental paintings and sculptures which draw on history, mythology, literature, philosophy and science,” says an RA statement. The art critic Jonathan Jones highlighted how Van Gogh’s shadow “loomed” in an exhibition of Kiefer’s works at White Cube, London, last year.
In an interview with The Art Newspaper earlier this year, Kiefer cited various influences, including the French novelist Jean Genet, the German philosopher Martin Heidegger and the Romanian poet Paul Celan. He also spoke about the fact he doesn't believe he has ever created a masterpiece, saying: “My talent is not enough. I never think a painting can be finished. It’s never finished, in my case.”
Other major shows due to open at the RA next year include a survey of works by the US artist Kerry James Marshall (20 September-18 January 2026). The exhibition, sponsored by the BNP Paribas bank, will feature around 70 works, including a new series of paintings made especially for the show and his commemorative sculpture Wake (2003).
In January, the RA will launch Brasil! Brasil! The Birth of Modernism (28 January-21 April), which will examine the impact of ten key 20th-century Brazilian artists such as Alfredo Volpi and Geraldo de Barros.
Meanwhile, the drawings of Victor Hugo, the author of Les Miserables (1862), are presented in Astonishing Things (21 March-29 June). “The exhibition will follow Hugo’s preoccupation with drawing, from his early caricatures and travel drawings to his dramatic landscapes and his experiments with abstraction,” a statement says.
Kiefer/ Van Gogh, the Royal Academy of Arts, 28 June-26 October 2025