Vincent van Gogh (Russell painting) Vincent van Gogh" (1887) and Paul Gauguin's "The Painter of Sunflowers" (1888). Van Gogh seems to have been particularly attached to Russell's portrait, which the Australian gifted to him as a mark of their friendship. The painting passed from Van Gogh to his brother Theo, then to their family, and is now in the permanent collection of the Van Gogh Museum in Amsterdam. Russell was born into a wealthy engineering family in 1858 in Sydney, New South Wales. The family business, P.N. Russell & Co, was responsible for much of the city's 19th-century ironwork. Although Russell had a strong interest
Early works of Vincent van Gogh be reminiscent for Van Gogh of the times in his youth he fled to the Zundert Woods to escape from his family. In November 1882 Van Gogh began drawings of individuals to depict a range of character types from the working class, "Worn Out" was one of the series. The works were drawn in a black in an angular style. On November 24, 1882 Van Gogh wrote to his brother Theo of Adrianus Zuyderland, the man who posed for "Worn Out" (F997), "What a fine sight an old working man makes, in his patched bombazine suit with his bald head".