Agostina Segatori Sitting in the Cafe du Tambourin Vincent van Gogh Buy Art Prints Now
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Tom Gurney BSc (Hons) is an art history expert with over 20 years experience
Published on June 19, 2020 / Updated on October 14, 2023
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During his career, Van Gogh painted several portraits, including Agostina Segatori Sitting in the Coffee shop du Tambourin created in 1887. For this picture, Agostina Segatori was Van Gogh's model.

Agostina Segatori was the possessor of the Tambourin Café. She had a short-lived association with Van Gogh. On the table, there is a glass of beer and Agostina holds a burning cigarette in her hand. The cup holders on the table show that she is currently drinking her second beer. Smoking and Drinking in a cafe were not suitable for decent ladies. This lifestyle has been associated with art and prostitutes. Agostina was also a model for Jean-Camille Corot, Edouard Manet and many other artists.

On this painting, he surrounds her with refined distinctions of green with reds and turquoise. The effect is both disturbing and decorative due to chromatic sensations that lead to the conjugation of corresponding colours. Agostina's Cafe was a gathering place for many artists, as well as Van Gogh and his colleagues. She permitted her café walls to be used by the painters to exhibit their work. Van was one of the artists who exhibited their works there. It was mainly floral quiet lives that Gogh offered to Agostina as compensation for food when he ran out of money. That was the initial chance for viewers to see a picture painted by Van Gogh.

In this picture, however, we view another exhibition of Japanese designs: When Gogh was in Paris, he started to collect Japanese patterns and exhibited them in February 1887 in the Café Agostina. In Agostina Segatori Sited in the Coffee shop du Tambourin, we perceive these Japanese engravings in the scene. Two geisha teenagers can be viewed on one of them and the rest is vague beyond identification. The lonely lady in the picture sits at a small bench, a theme presented by Comic artists like Degas and Manet. On the tables and chairs in the coffee shop, there were plates with tambourines, which we view in the picture.

Agostina wore fashionable clothes at that time. Her dress and jacket have an unalike pattern, her umbrella stays on the chair and her stylish hat on pins. She drinks her second goblet of beer, which the additional saucer proves, and smokes a cigarette. Van Gogh likely had a special thing with Agostina while painting, though it is not definite. Their connection, however, lasted only around six months. Gogh's relationship with Agostina came to an end when she became broke and Van Gogh's paintings and the café were seized by collectors. In the letters he wrote to Wilhelmina, his sister, he mentioned the shameful love relationships that occurred to him in Paris. Today, this painting dangles in the Netherlands, Museum of Van Gogh which is located in Amsterdam.