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
Posthumous fame of Vincent van Gogh Amsterdam, in a brutal and audacious robbery by experienced, professional thieves. Both of the stolen works were considered important - "Beach at Scheveningen in Stormy Weather" (1882) was van Gogh's first work in oil and "Congregation Leaving the Reformed Church in Nuenen" was painted by van Gogh for his mother and later adjusted after the death of his father. The daring raid on the gallery, by professional burglar Octave Durham and an accomplice, took only 3 minutes and 40 seconds. After a gap of some 14 years, both works were eventually recovered, in Castellammare di Stabia, near Pompeii, from Italian