Opening
Two women in different centuries stop asking and start acting. As rejections and gatekeepers pile up, Johanna Bonger becomes the uncompromising agent of Vincent’s legacy, while Emsley Wilson confronts her past, redraws her future, and claims her own voice. Their stories move in tandem from humiliation to audacity.
What Happens
Chapter 26: Rejection and Resolve
October 1891. Johanna travels to The Hague to seek support from Richard Roland Holst for an exhibition of Vincent van Gogh. Before the meeting, she walks the polder with Janus, the carpenter, choosing the spot where Vincent and his brother Theo van Gogh once pledged lifelong loyalty. In this reclaimed land—mirroring her bid to reclaim the brothers’ legacy—she reads a long-delayed letter from Paul Gauguin. It’s cruel and dismissive of Vincent. She tears it to shreds, refusing defeat on symbolic ground.
She then tells Janus the truth: her life’s work is Vincent and Theo’s memory. He understands. Holst does not. In his studio he calls Vincent’s art “garish,” “peasant material,” and sneers that her crusade is a “distraught feminine state of mind,” even offering to scrape the canvases for reuse. Johanna storms out. On the train, Janus quietly hands her a newspaper: Thomas Edison has demonstrated the Kinetoscope to an American women’s federation. The respect shown to women across the ocean, versus the contempt she’s just endured, clarifies her next move. “I’m going to America,” she says.
Chapter 27: Facing Dragons
In the present, Emsley oversees the removal of the antique carousel from Violet Velar’s house with Sergei, cousin to Bram Dekker. Galvanized by Johanna’s diary, she finds the address of Senator Wertheim—the man who assaulted Violet in 1965—and goes to him. She tells him she knows what he did at the Vanderbilt Mansion. He smirks, calling it “five minutes of fun,” and accuses her of blackmail. Emsley wants no money. She leaves him without revealing he has a granddaughter, feeling steadier for having faced him.
Back home, she gets practical. She negotiates a payment plan for Violet’s medical bills with a sympathetic administrator who remembers Violet’s past kindness. She emails Trey to formalize the split of their auction house, Ludington’s—staking claim to the New York office, key staff, and a shared client list. He agrees quickly. A text from Bram floats in at day’s end, inviting her to dinner and joking they can “eat in bed,” lifting her mood.
Chapter 28: A Circle of Friends
November 1891, Bussum. Johanna hosts a dinner for Dutch artists and intellectuals. She feels like an interloper, but she explains how she turns housework into a dance to save time for reading and translating French stories. Conversation veers to literature. The men dismiss Mrs. Oliphant as sentimental; Johanna and her friend Anna Wilson Veth defend the author’s stamina after devastating losses—an obvious mirror to Johanna’s own trial by grief.
When Janus arrives to cut a fallen tree, Johanna’s son Wil rushes to him, and her heart aches for the father Wil never knows. Later, Jan Veth tells her she is Vincent’s true champion: no one will ever care half as much. The talk of Oliphant’s grit and her friends’ faith crystallize Johanna’s answer. She stops waiting for a man to carry Vincent’s flag. “I shall represent Vincent myself,” she declares. Her circle rallies—Anna offers childcare; Seb sketches a plan for publishers and galleries. Johanna aims high: she will write the Rijksmuseum and follow up in person.
Chapter 29: Excalibur
Bram cancels dinner for a family emergency, but he and Emsley talk by phone late each night. On Saturday she cleans the small, grimy painting found with Johanna’s diary and reveals a stiffly rendered baby. Then Trey appears, begging her to leave Bram, marry him, merge their businesses, and build an empire. She’s done being the “nice girl.” She refuses and pushes him out.
Strena calls in a panic: her lead model at MoMA is sick. Emsley says yes. The performance requires nudity while Strena paints sugar filigree that hardens on the skin. Instead of shame, Emsley feels a fierce rebirth—a collective ritual of womanhood. Afterward she discovers a sugar sword down her torso—“Excalibur”—with a bold “V” for Violet over her heart: the piece is a tribute. Strena offers to rent the gallery floors of Violet’s house, solving Emsley’s cash flow crisis. Outside, raw and empowered, she finds Bram waiting with his grandfather and Sergei. He offers her a ride home; she blushes, suddenly aware she isn’t wearing underwear.
Chapter 30: Arts and Friendships
December 1891, Amsterdam. Johanna arrives at Arti et Amicitiae with two street boys and a heavy crate. The porter blocks her: “Ladies do not agent, madam.” She strides past, locates the director’s office, and locks herself in with the boys and the paintings.
Daan de Jong is more amused than angry. Johanna introduces herself as Vincent’s agent and uncrates three large works—The Starry Night, Blossoming Almond Tree, and Sunflowers. The drab office floods with color. She speaks from the heart about turbulence, hope, and renewal, explaining how the canvases feel and what she believes Vincent means. De Jong admits he doesn’t see everything she sees, but he sees the art’s effect on her—passion, loyalty, love. He grants an exhibition. After months of scorn, Johanna wins Vincent his first institutional foothold.
Key Events
- Johanna’s double rejection: Gauguin’s vicious letter and Holst’s sexist dismissal
- Emsley’s confrontation: she faces Senator Wertheim and refuses secrecy or payment
- “I shall represent Vincent myself”: Johanna claims the role no one will give her
- Excalibur at MoMA: Emsley’s nude performance becomes an act of reclamation
- Breakthrough at Arti et Amicitiae: Johanna persuades Daan de Jong to mount an exhibition
Character Development
Both heroines pivot from pleading to leading, converting pain into purpose.
- Johanna Bonger: Moves from petitioning gatekeepers to acting as Vincent’s agent. She rejects permission structures, orchestrates her own audience with de Jong, and reframes domestic constraint as a discipline that fuels her advocacy.
- Emsley Wilson: Confronts inherited trauma, ends her entanglement with Trey, and stabilizes her finances. Onstage at MoMA, she embraces vulnerability as strength, redefining her identity in public and in art.
Themes & Symbols
Female Empowerment and Perseverance
Johanna and Emsley meet entrenched contempt with action. “Ladies do not agent” becomes the wall Johanna breaks by simply walking through it; Emsley refuses both hush money and romantic coercion. Each builds a support network—artists, friends, and other women—that replaces gatekeepers with allies. Empowerment arrives not as permission, but as practice.
Legacy, Art, and Preservation
The polder’s reclaimed land mirrors Johanna’s effort to reclaim Vincent and Theo from obscurity, and Arti’s dingy office glows once she opens the crate. Art reshapes rooms—and lives. Emsley preserves Violet’s house by finding a tenant whose art aligns with Violet’s spirit, making preservation an act of living culture rather than static storage.
Finding One's Purpose and Identity
Johanna accepts that no expert will arrive to save Vincent’s reputation; she is the expert. Emsley sheds a people-pleasing past, asserts professional boundaries, and chooses boldness onstage. Both women turn exposure—public nudity, public nerve—into self-definition.
Key Quotes
“Ladies do not agent, madam.” The porter’s line distills the era’s rulebook. Johanna’s answer isn’t debate; it’s action—she locks the door and makes the art speak. The scene converts prohibition into platform.
“I shall represent Vincent myself.” A vow and a reframe. Johanna stops seeking patriarchal sponsorship and authorizes her own mission, shifting the story’s center of power to her conviction.
“Five minutes of fun.” Wertheim’s minimization exposes the violence of entitlement. Emsley’s refusal to trade truth for money denies him control and reclaims the narrative for Violet and herself.
“I cannot say I see everything you do… but I do see the effect they have on you… Even love.” De Jong validates art’s affective power and Johanna’s advocacy. He grants the exhibition not just because of the paintings, but because her testimony reveals their human stakes.
“If you hear a voice within say you cannot do something, then by all means, do that thing, and that voice will be silenced.” Attributed to Vincent, the quote becomes a method. Both women counter inner doubt and outer scorn with decisive action, and the voice falls quiet.
Why This Matters and Section Significance
These chapters mark a hinge in both timelines. Johanna’s first institutional “yes” proves that persistence and principled audacity can bend the art world’s gate. That victory initiates the long ascent of Vincent’s reputation—and of Johanna’s authority. Emsley’s confrontation, professional clean break, and MoMA performance function as a personal rebirth: she rejects secrecy and manipulation, chooses transparency and courage, and secures a viable path forward.
Together, their arcs show how legacies are built: not by waiting for approval, but by making space, gathering allies, and acting as if your purpose is already true—until it is.