The Unsung Marketing Legend Behind Van Gogh's $20 Billion Legacy

How Jo van Gogh Mastered Brand Marketing Before It Existed

In recognition of Jo van Gogh at this hundredth year since her passing, I’m inviting subscribers to enter a giveaway for a 5”x7” commemorative illustration of Jo created by graphic designer extraordinaire Maria Cavalini. See link to enter below.

In a time when it’s tempting to feel hopeless, as though one can’t make a difference—or even indifferent—to our turbulent times, Jo van Gogh’s example jolts me like a thunderclap.

See what you think.

What does it take to turn a pile of dusty, forgotten paintings from a failed artist into a global, billion-dollar sensation?

The answer is visionary marketing.

The answer is Jo van Gogh.

A hundred years ago, on September 2, 1925, the world lost Jo van Gogh-Bonger, but she had already cemented her legacy. More than an editor, translator, or teacher, she was an entrepreneurial force who single-handedly architected the legacy of her brother-in-law, Vincent van Gogh.

By the time she passed, she had transformed a worthless stockpile of art into one of the most beloved and valuable collections in history. Today, as we mark the centennial of her passing, it's time to honor her as the Greatest Marketer of the Century.

She was the impresario of his art, guiding the collection from dusty crates to a worldwide stage, one painting at a time.

Where’s the evidence?

First, check out the money.

From Zero to Billions

Vincent painted ferociously in his ten years as an artist (1880 - 1890). As he taught himself to draw and paint he moved from the Netherlands to Belgium to France, often leaving art works behind. In Paris, his art dealer brother Theo scattered paintings in galleries across the city.

While it's impossible to pin down the total value because many of Vincent's 2,100 works are still unaccounted for, a few public sales alone provide a glimpse into the astronomical worth Jo created.

• In 2022 Orchard with Cypresses alone sold for $117 million.

• Portrait of Dr. Gachet sold for $82.5 million in 1990, now estimated to be worth approx. $171 million in 2022 dollars.

  
  

As a result, the collection’s total worth is estimated to range from $10 - 20 billion today.

All because after Vincent's death and her husband Theo's passing shortly after, when 29-year-old Jo was left with a significant number of Vincent's paintings, she chose not to be passive. While running a boarding house for income and raising her son as a single parent, she set to work, organized exhibitions, published his letters, and carefully managed the sale of his art.

She refused to lower prices. As sales began to come in, she steadily raised them, including her own commission, building value in the marketplace.

Sales attracted attention from other art dealers who wanted in on the action. Like pushing a flywheel, Van Gogh’s worth escalated.

From zero to billions of dollars.

Creating Unprecedented Demand

In the fall of 1890, Theo had staged a posthumous exhibition of his brother’s paintings in their Montmartre apartment building. He was hopeful, even had a friend paint the room’s windows as fake stained glass to give the exhibition ambiance. Influential art dealer Paul Durand-Ruel had agreed to come!

But Durand-Ruel was a no-show.

No one was coming to see Van Gogh.

Against this background of years of failure by her husband to sell Vincent’s art, Jo decided to take her shot.

Shrewdly, she chose how to enter the market. Instead of succumbing to pressure to keep her (~400) inherited paintings in Paris—the commercial epicenter of the art world—she moved the collection to a small town in the Netherlands and into the attic of her guesthouse.

Starting small with local outreach, she built a strong foundation of support among Dutch art dealers. From this base of early advocates she expanded her reach as demand grew, first across Europe and then ultimately to a worldwide audience.

Today Van Gogh exhibitions guarantee a huge response.

The recent National Gallery in London’s “Van Gogh: Poets and Lovers” exhibition, which ran from Sept 14, 2024, to January 19, 2025, drew 334,589 visitors, making it the gallery’s most popular ticketed exhibition in its history.

The Musée d’Orsay in Paris reported in February 2024 that Van Gogh in Auvers-sur-Oise broke all previous attendance records during the four-month exhibition, welcoming a total of 793,556 visitors—an average of nearly 7,200 people per day. It became the most visited exhibition in the museum’s history.

And since its opening in 1973, the Van Gogh Museum has had more than 50 million visitors pass through its doors.

Three multimedia immersion shows (a combination of video, audio, lighting, and special effects) on Van Gogh are touring globally:

• Van Gogh Alive has drawn more than 8 million visitors in 70 cities worldwide.

• Van Gogh: The Immersive Experience has drawn more than 900,000 visitors in eight cities.

• Beyond Van Gogh has drawn over 650,000 visitors since 2017.

  
  

Jo’s shot worked.

From no-shows to record-breaking audiences.

Building an Enduring Brand

When Van Gogh died, for those who even recalled him, he was dismissed as a failed “madman.” His struggles with mental health had invalidated his art. This was the challenge Jo faced.

But Jo reversed this stigma with a single act: She published his letters.

By editing, translating and publishing his letters, she humanized him, moving his reputation beyond that of a "madman" to a sensitive and thoughtful genius. In 1914, she published the first volume of Letters to Theo. Two more volumes would follow. Ultimately, these and others’ published collections would establish the foundation for all modern Van Gogh scholarship.

Why was this effective?

It created a personal, emotional connection to the artist.

Read these touching comments about Van Gogh’s effect from social media:

• “His painting brings me tears every time! . . . Van Gogh invokes many wonderful and unknown feelings.”

• “My heart still breaks when I think about… how he never really felt the warmth of someone loving… I really, really wish he could know about how much we love him…”

• “As a child I was obsessed… I kept a picture of Starry Night… under my pillow... I cried when it ripped… ran… bawling… my most prized possession.”

• “Oh Vincent, if you only knew how much we love your art—it’s full of life!!!”

• “I simply love Van Gogh. He touches me every time.”

  
  

Stats back up this outpouring: The Van Gogh Museum’s combined social media audience includes Facebook (museum + Van Gogh pages) with over 4.4 million followers. On Twitter about 1.4 million. Instagram doubled last year to about 500,000 followers. And the Van Gogh Museum’s website logged 3.2 million unique visitors in 2024.

Museum surveys show 85% of visitors are from outside the Netherlands; visitors skew younger (under 35), many of whom discovered his work through an immersive exhibition or on social media.

The emotional outpouring and the younger demographic prove Jo’s brand-building was a success and has stood the test of time.

The Enduring Legacy of an Unsung Hero

Jo van Gogh-Bonger wasn't just a guardian of her brother-in-law's art; she was a brilliant, under-recognized marketing genius. She took a product with no value and created a multi-billion dollar global brand. She built a loyal audience from scratch, then cultivated a passionate community around it.

Yet, for all her success, Jo's legacy has been systematically overlooked. I know this because when I visited the Van Gogh Museum in 2016 and saw a small notation about her,

I was struck by the enormity of her anonymity.

I remember staring at her black-and-white photo thinking, “If not for you, no one would know Van Gogh.”

No Starry Night. No Sunflowers. No Irises.

Jo’s erasure felt enormous.

And unjust.

Two years later curiosity about her story would incite me to resign from my career to dedicate myself to researching and writing and ultimately publishing my book, Saving Vincent, A Novel of Jo van Gogh.

Along the way, my professional experience in marketing and business left me amazed at her extraordinary commercial success.

I wondered that in a capitalistic society that rewards and lauds financial gain, why wouldn’t she be heralded?

Her entrepreneurial spirit and efforts are textbook examples. She took a risk, invested her time and effort, and created immense value from a seemingly worthless collection. Yet, her story is rarely framed in this light. Instead, the focus remains on the tragic, tortured artist—a more romantic, and perhaps more marketable, narrative.

In her initial efforts, she was cast aside. Worse, subjected to vicious gender bias in a male-dominated art world. Her work was scorned as overly emotional, manipulative, nothing more than the ”pious cult of the dead brother.”

But Jo persevered.

And when her Van Goghs began to sell, she raised the prices.

When demand grew, she raised them again.

And again.

Along the way, she cultivated an immense adoration for Vincent, so enormous its ripple effects continue to spread today.

From the chaos of Vincent's death and her husband's passing, Jo was faced with a choice. And in that space between stimulus and response, she chose opportunity.

As Viktor Frankl so wisely wrote... “Between stimulus and response there is a space. In that space is our power to choose our response. In our response lies our growth and our freedom.”

In a time when it’s tempting to feel hopeless, as though one can’t make a difference—or even indifferent—to our turbulent times, Jo van Gogh’s example jolts me like a thunderclap.

She chose well, didn’t she? The results of her response still reverberate.

For all of these reasons, in my view, Jo is the Greatest Marketer of the Century.

And my personal role model.

Warmly,