A special exhibition titled “Van Gogh: the Flaming Soul,” showcasing works by the 19th century Dutch painter Vincent Van Gogh, will open at the National Museum of History on December 11, museum officials said.

Ninety-eight of Van Gogh’s works — 77 sketches and 21 oil paintings — will be on display at the exhibition, which will run through March 28 next year, said Huang Yung-chuan (黃永川), director of the museum.

Most of the works will be on loan from the Netherlands’ Kroller-Muller Museum in Otterlo, but one piece, Vase with Flower and Thistles, painted by Van Gogh one month before his suicide, will come from Japan’s Pola Museum of Art, Huang said.

Other Van Gogh masterpieces to be displayed will include Self Portrait and Cypress Against a Starry Sky. The show will be the first Van Gogh exhibition in the Mandarin-speaking world.

To ensure the security of the artworks, the National Museum of History has bought insurance worth nearly NT$30 billion (US$914.63 million) for the exhibition — unprecedented for an art exhibition in this country.

Although he was active as an artist for only 10 years, Van Gogh left an abundant body of work of more than 800 paintings and 1,200 sketches.

In preparation for the exhibition, the museum will be closed next month and in November to allow for the upgrading of its facilities and security system, Huang said.

The National Museum of History has held several meetings with the staff of the Kroller-Muller Museum to discuss security issues, and security personnel from the Dutch museum have also visited Taiwan several times to inspect the Taipei museum’s facilities and security.

The museum will hire 15 guards to maintain security during the exhibition, while police will also deploy round-the-clock patrols, Huang said.

He anticipated that “Van Gogh fever” will seize Taiwan, even though admission to the exhibition will cost NT$300.

The “Millet — The Beauty of the Countryside” exhibition that the National Museum of History cohosted with the Musee D’Orsay drew a record 700,000 visitors, Huang said.