Edvard Munch: A Guide to Munch’s Life and Paintings

Edvard Munch was a Norwegian painter and printmaker whose work explores inner anguish, isolation, and anxiety. Munch rebelled against the naturalism of nineteenth-century academic art paintings, and the psychological and sexual tones of his work caused controversy during his lifetime. Munch’s expression of human emotion, both stylistically and thematically, was his greatest contribution to the modern art movement.

Munch’s life was rife with illness and despair, which was reflected in his work.

• Early life: Edvard Munch was born in 1863 in Löten, Norway. Munch had a difficult childhood, losing his mother, father, and two siblings at an early age, while another sibling developed a mental illness.
• The Kristiania Bohème: Around 1884, Munch received instruction from Christian Krohg, a painter in the Kristiania Bohème, a group of anti-bourgeois writers and artists based in Oslo. During this time he visited Paris and became interested in the work of the Impressionists, Symbolists, and Post-Impressionists, especially Henri de Toulouse-Lautrec and Paul Gauguin. Munch started to develop his own style, using flowing lines and non-naturalistic colors to represent an intense interior world.
• Public controversy: In 1892, Munch showed at the Association of Berlin Artists. His work was so controversial that the exhibition was shut down, and Munch became infamous in Germany, where he decided to stay for the next several years.
• Graphic art: While living in Berlin, Munch worked on graphic design, producing lithographs, etchings, and woodcuts. Without any formal training in graphic art, he developed unique techniques, such as incorporating the grain of the wood into his designs.
• Nervous breakdown: In 1908, Munch suffered a nervous breakdown and moved back to Norway to focus on his recovery. He began to shift away from the themes of mental illness, insanity, jealousy, sexual awakening, and instead painted landscapes, commissioned portraits, and everyday people.
• Death: Munch died in 1944 at the age of 80 near Oslo. He left the majority of his artwork to the city of Oslo for the founding of the Munch Museum, which opened in 1963.

Edvard Munch began his painting career in the naturalistic style traditional of the time, but by the age of 23, he had developed his own unique style, which involves three distinct characteristics.

1. 1. Expressive use of line: Munch used dramatic lines to convey emotion in his work. Most famous are the repeated, swirling lines of The Scream (1893), but Munch also used strong vertical and horrizontal lines.
2. 2. Non-naturalistic colors: Inspired by Post-Impressionists, Munch used color to express emotions rather than to mimic real life. Munch’s use of bright reds, yellows, and blues add volume to his subjects. His lithographs showcase his ability to work monochromatically.
3. 3. Repetition: Munch’s was constantly reworking his favorite motifs, and some of his most famous works were created in various forms. For example, Munch created four compositions of The Scream: an oil and tempera painting on cardboard, two pastels, a lithograph, and a tempera painting.

Munch was a prolific artist with a long career. His most celebrated works include:

1. 1. The Sick Child (1885–6): Considered Munch’s first great work, this piece was inspired by the artist's eldest sister Sophie, who died of tuberculosis when she was 15. The deep marks left by the palette knife suggest the artist’s anguish, while the delicate rendering of the child’s face captures the liminal space just before death. Munch painted and printed different versions of The Sick Child for decades.
2. 2. The Frieze of Life (1890s): This series of 22 paintings, begun in 1893, was exhibited in 1902 at the Berlin Secession. The Frieze of Life features some of Munch’s most famous works, including The Scream, Madonna, and Death in the Sickroom. The series explores Munch’s most prominent themes of love, sexuality, sickness, angst, and death.
3. 3. The Scream (1893): Munch stated that The Scream was inspired by a hallucination. The curves of the corpse-like figure’s face, hands, and body are echoed in the landscape, creating a sense of anxiety that moves beyond the figure into the entire world.
4. 4. Self Portrait. Between the Clock and the Bed (1940–3): This is the last self-portrait Munch painted. In it, he stands between a faceless grandfather clock with no hands and his bed. Munch, who at this time was in his seventies, stands calm at the edge of life.

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