1r:1
London, 16 June 1874

My dear Theo,
Thanks for your letter.
I think I’ll be leaving here on Thursday, 25 or Saturday, 27 June, if nothing unforeseen happens.1 I’m longing so much to see everyone and Holland. I’m also looking forward to having a good talk with you about art, start thinking about any questions you might want to put to me.
We have many beautiful things here, including a spirited painting by Jacquet, and a beautiful Boldini.2  1v:2
There are beautiful things at the Royal Academy this year; among others Tissot has 3 paintings.3
I’ve been drawing again recently, but it was nothing special.4
I was glad to see in your letter that you visit the Haanebeeks.
Adieu, goodbye for now, give my regards to all my friends. Ever,

Your brother.
Vincent.

I’m glad you like César de Cock so much; he’s one of the few painters to have understood our Brabant intimately enough.5 I don’t know whether I told you that I met him last year in Paris.6

023

Br. 1990: 023 | CL: 17
From: Vincent van Gogh
To: Theo van Gogh
Date: London, Tuesday, 16 June 1874
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1. Van Gogh left for the Netherlands on 27 June 1874 and arrived in Helvoirt on 28 June (FR b2709).
2. It is not known which paintings this refers to.
3. An exhibition of the work of living artists was held every summer at the Royal Academy of Arts (in Burlington House on Piccadilly). Three works by James Tissot were on display that year: London visitors, c. 1874 (Toledo, Toledo Museum of Art. Purchased with funds from the Libbey Endowment. Gift of Edward Drummond Libbey), ill. 1699 [1699]; Waiting (present whereabouts unknown), described in ‘The Royal Academy’, The Art Journal (July 1874), no. 151, p. 200 as: ‘autumn leaves overhanging the figure of a young lady waiting in a boat’; and The ball on shipboard, 1874 (London, Tate, presented by the Trustees of the Chantrey Bequest 1937). Ill. 1700 [1700]. See Wentworth 1984, p. 201.
[1699] [1700]
4. It is not known which drawings this refers to. The drawing, previously attributed to Van Gogh, depicting the house at 87 Hackford Road (private collection), is thought by M. Vellekoop and S. van Heugten of the Van Gogh Museum not to be by his hand. Cf. Kenneth Wilkie, ‘Yes! It’s an original’, Holland Herald 8-2 (1973), pp. 10-13; and exhib. cat. London 1992, p. 120, cat. no. 7.
5. César de Cock, known as a painter of landscapes of Flanders and northern France, was called ‘the Flemish brother of Corot’.
6. The meeting referred to must have taken place during Van Gogh’s stay in Paris in May 1873.