According to myth-busting German art historians Hans Kaufmann and Rita Wildegans, Gauguin sliced off Van Gogh’s ear with a sword, and both artists agreed to a cover-up in which Van Gogh claimed to have done it himself. They (the historians) lay out their case in a new book, Van Gogh’s Ear: Paul Gauguin and the Pact of Silence. Curators at the Van Gogh Museum in Amsterdam stand by the orthodox self-mutilation theory.
