Edvard Munch 

Biography

Edvard Munch was born in Løten, Norway, on December 12, 1863, and died in Oslo, the capital of the same country, on January 23, 1944. He was an outstanding painter and engraver. Munch is recognized as one of the main influences for the creation of expressionism. Most of his paintings belong to the artistic current of symbolism; in them, the intention to show an interior point of view, less accurate, but with more emphasis on human emotions.

The artist painted about one thousand one hundred paintings, fifteen thousand engravings and four thousand drawings and watercolors. He used to make several versions of the same work. The most famous painting of Edvard Munch, worldwide, is The Scream, created in 1893.

In the Scream, a restless figure is shown who touches his face with both hands while screaming. The expression of the being is in complete restlessness. In the background there are two passers-by indifferent to the anguish of the figure; behind them, the sky and a hill seem to join. The contrast of colors, derived from blue and red, together with the reduction of forms, causes a chaotic effect, similar to that caused by a real scream. In his notes of 1892, Munch describes how he found inspiration for the work: during a walk. At that moment he was afraid, he shuddered, “I felt an infinite scream pierce nature.”

Painting is part of the most important works in the history of art. One of its versions is in the National Museum of Norway and another one is exhibited in the Munch-Museet, in Oslo. Both have suffered attempted theft. The first, in 1994; the second, in 2004.

Edvard Munch was the son of Laura Cathrine Bjølstad and military doctor Christian Munch, who had anxiety problems and an obsession with Christianity practiced by Luther, more exactly Pietism. Munch had four brothers: Peter Andreas, Inger Marie, Laura Catherine and Johanne Sophie, the one the painter most loved.

In 1864, the family moved to Oslo. Munch’s mother died of tuberculosis in 1868. The children were raised by their aunt Karen and by their father, who used to read them the stories of Edgar Allan Poe. In 1877, the young Johanne Sophie died because of the same illness suffered by their mother; the loss affected Munch noticeably. Perhaps in his work The Sick Girl, of 1886, the artist remembered what happened. In it, a girl rests in bed and observes the mother, who sinks her face on a pillow, as if she prefers not to see her daughter in those conditions. The sad facts would not leave Munch: soon after, his younger sister, Laura Catherine, was also diagnosed with mental problems.

Munch drew frequently and soon realized that he wanted to devote himself to painting; his father never liked the decision. The artist’s adolescence took place in Oslo. In that city, the young man started engineering studies, although he did not finish them. Then he entered the Royal School of Art and Design. In 1881, he was able to sell two of his paintings. Since then, he was included in some autumn artistic exhibitions held in Oslo. He also traveled frequently from Norway to France and Germany, because of his painting studies.

In the beginning, Munch would be influenced by the Impressionists Édouard Manet and Claude Monet. However, after a while he discovered that his artistic intentions were moving away from them; his style would be closer to the symbolism, being influenced by Vincent van Gogh and Paul Gauguin. At that time, Munch would begin The Frieze of Life, a cycle of paintings that contains some of his most important works, and which was completed in 1900.

The criticism towards his paintings was unfavorable. However, his talent would be recognized later. His works were exhibited in the Cassirer Gallery, in Berlin, and in the Cometer Gallery, Hamburg, among others. The painter was always curious about the writings of the Norwegian Henrik Ibsen, he was against photography as art and, despite the erotic content of some works, Munch always maintained a strong repression and sexual discretion.

In 1905, he suffered from neurasthenia, a neurotic disorder associated with excessive physical or mental fatigue; constant nervous breakdowns would accompany him for the rest of his life. He also suffered from alcoholism. In 1908, he experienced a severe crisis and was admitted to a clinic. In search of stabilizing his health, he began to include more color in his works and devoted himself to the creation of portraits and self-portraits.

In 1930, because of age, he abandoned painting; he resorted to it only occasionally. After the growth of Nazism and the invasion of it in Norway, most of Munch’s paintings were removed from the galleries, as they were considered of poor quality. In the middle of the Second World War, the artist was honored several times. His first exhibition in America took place much earlier, in 1912, and it was in New York.

Edvard Munch would die on a farm owned by him, in Oslo, at the age of eighty. In 1963, as a commemoration, the Munch-Museet was created. In one of his notes is the following sentence: “From my rotten body, flowers will grow, and I am in them and that is the eternity.”

Munch was a painter of human passions and emotions. Among his most important works are Anxiety, of 1894; Love and pain, of 1895; The Madonna, of 1895; and The Kiss, of 1897.