New Year’s Eve associations about missing Van Gogh statue: ‘We are not immediately nervous about the report’

It remains to be seen whether the vanished statue of 19th-century painter Vincent van Gogh will return to its pedestal in Assen before Christmas. The five largest New Year’s Eve associations active in Drenthe and Friesland are not surprised that the city-centre organization Fart has now reported the theft of this statue to the police. “It doesn’t make us nervous right away.”

This is evidenced by a tour by RTV Drenthe, which spoke to representatives of the five associations: De Oliebol from Vledder, De Nachtdravers from Donkerbroek, De Geitefok from Oldeberkoop, Vesuvius from Elsloo and Tied Zat from Zorgvlied. Immediately after the more than four-metre-tall statue was removed at the Van de Vaart Kop at the start of last week, there were strong suspicions that this was a so-called “stunt” by the club on New Year’s Eve. Especially since the image was replaced with a sign with the text written on it “I was a bit surprised last night, I’m somewhere else with my brush now.”

The five associations did not say whether they had the photo or not. The fact that the theft has been reported does not immediately make associations nervous. “It’s not that we would return the statue immediately if we got it,” says Dominik Veenstra of TEDZAT. “It also depends on how big the interests are and whether a lot of trouble is expected. In principle, the associations use January 1st as a time to offer back what has been ‘borrowed’.”

“It just depends on how the association handles this,” says Harold Vogelzang of De Nachtdravers. “On the one hand, you are talking about associations with volunteers who just want to do something fun and do not feel like making a fuss. On the other hand, it is also sporty to wait until January 1st. Moreover, this situation “generates publicity around this game. And also to the owners of the photo, because this photo is now in the news more often.”

There is no panic yet at the Vesuvius New Year’s Eve Assembly. “If we had the photo, we would have announced it on January 1,” says Mies van den Berg. “Although I can also imagine – if we had the photo – that we might think about it again in the meantime, because of the announcement.” . Vesuvius.

Various associations have previously learned that the theft had been reported. This happened, for example, three years ago, when de Olepoul escaped with the statues of the Maya Bee and the Wiki Vikings from Plopsa in Coevorden. Last year, De Geitefok removed the letters T, O and P from the top 2,000 companies in Hilversum.

Janbart Hof from De Geitefok: “As an association on New Year’s Eve, you shouldn’t give up too quickly, that’s part of the game. As an association, you know that there are some risks when you ‘borrow’ items.”

However, there is also a possibility that the statue will return to Kop van de Vaart earlier than planned. “If a report is submitted and there is indeed a problem, the association may decide to return the statue before New Year’s Day.” De Geitefok did this last year with the Top 2000 letters. “Then we finally returned the letters on New Year’s Day.”