Life and death in the paintings of Edvard Munch

Emotionally rich paintings in which the artist reflected all his fears and experiences will leave no one indifferent.

“No longer shall I paint interiors with men reading and women knitting. I will paint living people who breathe and feel and suffer and love.” Edvard Munch

Edvard Munch is a Norwegian painter whose art evokes a whole range of emotions. Tragic, nervous, doomed, his paintings are full of contrast colors, sharpness of forms and inevitable rhythm of composition.

In 1883 the name of Edvard Munch was first heard in Norwegian society. As a creative debut, the expressionist presented "A Study of the Head". The formation of a great artist has begun.

In subsequent years, Munch repeatedly participated in exhibitions, but his work was lost among the brightness of shades and loud names of artists. In 1886, Edvard presented “The Sick Child” and received a barrage of negative reviews.

The reason for criticism was the apparent incompleteness and formlessness of the work. The young artist was accused of unwillingness to improve and develop his technique. And Munch considered “The Sick Child” his breakthrough. After harsh criticism, Edvard ceased to be sincere, his painting became uninteresting and stiff.

At the end of 1889, when Munch went to study in Paris, the news of his father’s death came. The artist became depressed, broke off ties with friends. This event became the crucial moment in his work of expressionism.

Returning to his homeland, the artist began creating a series of paintings, which later became known as The Frieze of Life and consisted of 22 paintings: a poem about love, life, and death.

Among the numerous paintings of Edvard Munch, the most famous is "The Scream". In the usual edition, it depicts a humanoid creature, the sky is colored in bright orange-red shades. A cry, bursting out from the lipless mouth of a humanoid as if melts the landscape around. Two more figures are visible behind.

In his diary, describing the story behind the painting’s idea, Munch wrote that he “sensed an infinite scream passing through nature”.
A year later, Munch sketched a humanoid with pastels, then, painted it with oil. Later two more were added to these versions. Particularly popular is the painting of 1893, which is stored in the National Museum in Oslo.

Art historians found a place where Edvard could see the picture. An interesting fact is that earlier Oslo’s largest slaughterhouse and mental hospital were located near this place.  It was said that the cries of animals being slaughtered, mixed with the screams of mentally ill people, were unbearable. Probably, that’s where “an infinite scream passing through nature” came from.

The year 1894 was marked by the appearance of two works - “Puberty” and “Girl and Death”. Both paintings combine contrasting phenomena. Thus, in “Puberty,” a black, frightening shadow hung over a young, fragile, frightened girl's nakedness. In the work “Girl and Death”, the pompous beauty kisses skeletal death, accepting her as a best friend. Such opposition is a characteristic of the modernist style.
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Munch created paintings in different genres: portrait, landscape, still life. The artist died in Norway, near Oslo. The result of his life was more than 1000 paintings, 4.5 thousand drawings, and 18 thousand graphic works.