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115-491: The Scream is a composition created by Norwegian artist Edvard Munch in 1893. The Norwegian name of the piece is Skrik (Scream), and the German title under which it was first exhibited is Der Schrei der Natur (The Scream of Nature). The agonized face in the painting has become one of the most iconic images in art, seen as symbolizing the anxiety of the human condition . Munch's work, including The Scream , had

230-601: A sting operation with assistance from the British police ( SO10 ) and the Getty Museum and the painting was recovered undamaged on 7 May 1994. In January 1996, four men were convicted in connection with the theft, including Pål Enger , who had been convicted of stealing Munch's Love and Pain in 1988. They were released on appeal on legal grounds: the British agents involved in the sting operation had entered Norway under false identities. The 1910 version of The Scream

345-465: A "liberated" upper-class woman. They traveled to Italy together and upon returning, Munch began another fertile period in his art, which included landscapes and his final painting in "The Frieze of Life" series, The Dance of Life (1899). Larsen was eager for marriage, but Munch was not. His drinking and poor health reinforced his fears, as he wrote in the third person: "Ever since he was a child he had hated marriage. His sick and nervous home had given him

460-542: A French audience. Still, many of the Parisian critics still considered Munch's work "violent and brutal" even if his exhibitions received serious attention and good attendance. His financial situation improved considerably and, in 1897, Munch bought himself a summer house facing the fjords of Kristiania, a small fisherman's cabin built in the late 18th century, in the small town of Åsgårdstrand in Norway. He dubbed this home

575-405: A bright door opens up for me." However, despite this positive change, Munch's self-destructive and erratic behavior led him first to a violent quarrel with another artist, then to an accidental shooting in the presence of Tulla Larsen, who had returned for a brief reconciliation, which injured two of his fingers. Munch later sawed a self-portrait depicting him and Larsen in half as a consequence of

690-472: A feeling of distortion of the environment and one's self. Arthur Lubow has described The Scream as "an icon of modern art, a Mona Lisa for our time." It has been widely interpreted as representing the universal anxiety of modern humanity. Munch created four versions, two in paint and two in pastels . The first version was painted in 1893, between Berlin in Germany and Åsgårdstrand in Norway. It

805-464: A formative influence on the Expressionist movement. Munch recalled that he had been out for a walk at sunset when suddenly the setting sun's light turned the clouds " a blood red ". He sensed an "infinite scream passing through nature". Scholars have located the spot to a fjord overlooking Oslo and have suggested other explanations for the unnaturally orange sky, ranging from the effects of

920-481: A great stir—a lot of antagonism—and a lot of approval." The Berlin critics were beginning to appreciate Munch's work even though the public still found his work alien and strange. The good press coverage gained Munch the attention of influential patrons Albert Kollman and Max Linde . He described the turn of events in his diary, "After 20 years of struggle and misery forces of good finally come to my aid in Germany—and

1035-425: A large canvas that would be known as the grand culmination of his thoughts. Following the completion of Where Do We Come From? What Are We? Where Are We Going? Gauguin made a suicide attempt with arsenic. The three major groups in the painting reflect the overall themes presented in the title. The three crouched women with a sleeping child on the right represent the beginning of life; the middle group symbolizes

1150-490: A madman"). It can only be seen on close examination of the painting. This had been presumed to be a comment by a critic or a visitor to an exhibition. It was first noticed when the painting was exhibited in Copenhagen in 1904, eleven years after this version was painted. Following infrared photography , the study of the handwriting now shows that the comment was added by Munch. The theory has been put forward that Munch added

1265-567: A model. Without any effort, Munch attracted a steady stream of female models, whom he painted as the subjects of numerous nude paintings. He likely had sexual relationships with some of them. Munch occasionally left his home to paint murals on commission, including those done for the Freia chocolate factory. To the end of his life, Munch continued to paint unsparing self-portraits, adding to his self-searching cycle of his life and his unflinching series of takes on his emotional and physical states. In

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1380-424: A musical based on the painting's theft starring Pål Enger who stole it in 1994. A patient resource group for trigeminal neuralgia (which has been described as the most painful condition in existence) have also adopted the image as a symbol of the condition. In most renderings, the emoji U+1F631 😱 FACE SCREAMING IN FEAR is made to resemble the subject of the painting. A simplified version of

1495-500: A need to go deeper and explore situations brimming with emotional content and expressive energy. Under Jæger's commandment that Munch should "write his life", meaning that Munch should explore his own emotional and psychological state, the young artist began a period of reflection and self-examination, recording his thoughts in his "soul's diary". This deeper perspective helped move him to a new view of his art. He wrote that his painting The Sick Child (1886), based on his sister's death,

1610-433: A new optimistic style—broad, loose brushstrokes of vibrant color with frequent use of white space and rare use of black—with only occasional references to his morbid themes. With more income Munch was able to buy several properties giving him new vistas for his art and he was finally able to provide for his family. The outbreak of World War I found Munch with divided loyalties, as he stated, "All my friends are German but it

1725-613: A purely abusive sense. When his painting The Sick Child was first displayed in Oslo in 1886, Gustav Wentzel and other young Realists encircled Munch and accused him of being a "madman;" another critic Johan Scharffenberg stated that because Munch derived from an "insane family" his art was also "insane." He is claimed by some to have had borderline personality disorder , a mental health disorder characterized by fear of abandonment , chronic feelings of emptiness, impulsive behavior , and various other symptoms. Munch also displayed alcoholism ,

1840-444: A record price of nearly US$ 120 million at auction on 2 May 2012. The bidding started at $ 40 million and lasted for over 12 minutes when American businessman Leon Black by phone gave the final offer of US$ 119,922,500, including the buyer's premium . Sotheby's described the work as "the most colorful and vibrant" of the four versions Munch painted, noting also his hand-colouring of the frame on which he inscribed his poem which detailed

1955-466: A simplification of form and detail which marked his early mature style. Munch also began to favor a shallow pictorial space and a minimal backdrop for his frontal figures. Since poses were chosen to produce the most convincing images of states of mind and psychological conditions, as in Ashes , the figures impart a monumental, static quality. Munch's figures appear to play roles on a theatre stage ( Death in

2070-407: A single body of expression. So to capitalize on his production and make some income, he turned to graphic arts to reproduce many of his paintings, including those in this series. Munch admitted to the personal goals of his work but he also offered his art to a wider purpose, "My art is really a voluntary confession and an attempt to explain to myself my relationship with life—it is, therefore, actually

2185-497: A sort of egoism, but I am constantly hoping that through this I can help others achieve clarity." While attracting strongly negative reactions, in the 1890s Munch began to receive some understanding of his artistic goals, as one critic wrote, "With ruthless contempt for form, clarity, elegance, wholeness, and realism, he paints with intuitive strength of talent the most subtle visions of the soul." One of his great supporters in Berlin

2300-415: A specific meaning almost immediately to almost every viewer. These few works have successfully made the transition from the elite realm of the museum visitor to the enormous venue of popular culture. In December 1893, Unter den Linden in Berlin was the location of an exhibition of Munch's work, showing, among other pieces, six paintings entitled Study for a Series: Love. This began a cycle he later called

2415-407: A studio with other students. His full-length portrait of Karl Jensen-Hjell, a notorious bohemian-about-town, earned a critic's dismissive response: "It is impressionism carried to the extreme. It is a travesty of art." Munch's nude paintings from this period survive only in sketches, except for Standing Nude (1887). They may have been confiscated by his father. Impressionism inspired Munch from

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2530-771: A trait often associated with impulsivity in BPD. In 1879, Munch enrolled in a technical college to study engineering, where he excelled in physics , chemistry and mathematics . He learned scaled and perspective drawing, but frequent illnesses interrupted his studies. The following year, much to his father's disappointment, Munch left the college determined to become a painter. His father viewed art as an "unholy trade", and his neighbors reacted bitterly and sent him anonymous letters. In contrast to his father's rabid pietism, Munch adopted an undogmatic stance towards art. He wrote his goal in his diary: "In my art I attempt to explain life and its meaning to myself." In 1881, Munch enrolled at

2645-756: A variety of brushstroke techniques and color palettes throughout the 1880s and early 1890s, as he struggled to define his style. His idiom continued to veer between naturalistic , as seen in Portrait of Hans Jæger , and impressionistic , as in Rue Lafayette . His Inger on the Beach (1889), which caused another storm of confusion and controversy, hints at the simplified forms, heavy outlines, sharp contrasts, and emotional content of his mature style to come. He began to carefully calculate his compositions to create tension and emotion. While stylistically influenced by

2760-514: A volcanic eruption to a psychological reaction by Munch to his sister's commitment at a nearby lunatic asylum . Munch created two versions in paint and two in pastels , as well as a lithograph stone from which several prints survive. Both painted versions have been stolen, but since recovered. In 2012, one of the pastel versions commanded the highest nominal price paid for an artwork at a public auction at that time. In his diary in an entry headed "Nice 22 January 1892", Munch wrote: One evening I

2875-404: A young age. During these early years, he experimented with many styles, including Naturalism and Impressionism. Some early works are reminiscent of Manet. Many of these attempts brought him unfavorable criticism from the press and garnered him constant rebukes by his father, who nonetheless provided him with small sums for living expenses. At one point, however, Munch's father, perhaps swayed by

2990-846: Is France I love." In the 1930s, his German patrons, many Jewish, lost their fortunes and some their lives during the rise of the Nazi movement. Munch found Norwegian printers to substitute for the Germans who had been printing his graphic work. Given his poor health history, during 1918 Munch felt himself lucky to have survived a bout of the Spanish flu , the worldwide pandemic of that year. Munch spent most of his last two decades in solitude at his nearly self-sufficient estate in Ekely, at Skøyen , Oslo. Many of his late paintings celebrate farm life, including several in which he used his work horse "Rousseau" as

3105-423: Is Munch's most famous work, and one of the most recognizable paintings in all art. It has been widely interpreted as representing the universal anxiety of modern man. Painted with broad bands of garish color and highly simplified forms, and employing a high viewpoint, it reduces the agonized figure to a garbed skull in the throes of an emotional crisis. With this painting, Munch met his stated goal of "the study of

3220-399: Is a crouched figure who lifts her arm. The three women have been interpreted by one scholar as representing the contrast between enlightenment and “superstitious, irrational, even barbaric traditions”. The painting also includes several inscriptions. Gauguin inscribed the original French title in the upper left corner: D'où Venons Nous / Que Sommes Nous / Où Allons Nous . The inscription

3335-506: Is all he paints. For this reason Munch's pictures are as a rule "not complete", as people are so delighted to discover for themselves. Oh, yes, they are complete. His complete handiwork. Art is complete once the artist has really said everything that was on his mind, and this is precisely the advantage Munch has over painters of the other generation, that he really knows how to show us what he has felt, and what has gripped him, and to this he subordinates everything else. Munch continued to employ

3450-402: Is considered an innovator of the woodcut medium in Norway. In December 1889 his father died, leaving Munch's family destitute. He returned home and arranged a large loan from a wealthy Norwegian collector when wealthy relatives failed to help, and assumed financial responsibility for his family from then on. Christian's death depressed him and he was plagued by suicidal thoughts: "I live with

3565-532: Is dispersed in the separate and disconnected figures of sorrow. In 1894, he enlarged the spectrum of motifs by adding Anxiety , Ashes , Madonna and Women in Three Stages (from innocence to old age). Around the start of the 20th century, Munch worked to finish the "Frieze". He painted a number of pictures, several of them in bigger format and to some extent featuring the Art Nouveau aesthetics of

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3680-542: Is in the collection of the Munch Museum , also in Oslo. The second pastel version, from 1895, was sold for $ 119,922,600 at Sotheby's Impressionist and Modern Art auction on 2 May 2012 to financier Leon Black . The second painted version dates from 1910, during a period when Munch revisited some of his prior compositions. It is also in the collection of the Munch Museum. These versions have seldom traveled, though

3795-480: Is notable for its enigmatic subject and atmosphere. Some scholars have attributed these qualities to personal conflicts that Gauguin experienced while creating this artwork. It is an accentuation of Gauguin's trailblazing Post-Impressionistic style. Frizeau sold the painting around 1913 to Galerie Barbazanges, which sold it before 1920 to the Norwegian ship owner and art collector Jørgen Breder Stang [no]. He sold

3910-470: Is the most colorful of the versions and is distinctive for the downward-looking stance of one of its background figures. It is also the only version not held by a Norwegian museum. The 1893 version was stolen from the National Gallery in Oslo in 1994 and was recovered. The 1910 painting was stolen in 2004 from the Munch Museum in Oslo, but recovered in 2006 with limited damage. The Scream

4025-651: Is the symbol-laden element. Considered by the artist and journalist Christian Krohg as the first Symbolist painting by a Norwegian artist, Melancholy was exhibited in 1891 at the Autumn Exhibition in Oslo. In 1892, Adelsteen Normann , on behalf of the Union of Berlin Artists, invited Munch to exhibit at its November exhibition, the society's first one-man exhibition. However, his paintings evoked bitter controversy (dubbed "The Munch Affair"), and after one week

4140-898: Is the topic of Edvard Munch: Trembling Earth at the Clark Art Institute . In 1896, Munch moved to Paris, where he focused on graphic representations of his Frieze of Life themes. He further developed his woodcut and lithographic technique. Munch's Self-Portrait with Skeleton Arm (1895) is done with an etching needle-and-ink method also used by Paul Klee . Munch also produced multi-colored versions of The Sick Child , concerning tuberculosis , which sold well, as well as several nudes and multiple versions of Kiss (1892). In May 1896, Siegfried Bing held an exhibition of Munch's work inside Bing's Maison de l'Art Nouveau . The exhibition displayed 60 works, including The Kiss, The Scream, Madonna, The Sick Child, The Death Chamber, and The Day After. Bing's exhibition helped to introduce Munch to

4255-478: Is widely identified with the angst of the modern person. Between 1893 and 1910, he made two painted versions and two in pastels, as well as a number of prints. One of the pastels would eventually command the fourth highest nominal price paid for a painting at auction. As his fame and wealth grew, his emotional state remained insecure. He briefly considered marriage, but could not commit himself. A mental breakdown in 1908 forced him to give up heavy drinking, and he

4370-472: The Mercure de France acknowledged grudging respect for the work but thought the allegory would be impenetrable without the inscription, and compared the painting to Inter artes et naturam (Between Art and Nature) of Pierre Puvis de Chavannes . Although Gauguin appreciated the works of Puvis, he wanted to differentiate his works from “the great master of decorative painting”. He explained to Fontainas that

4485-566: The Exposition Universelle (1889) and roomed with two fellow Norwegian artists. His picture Morning (1884) was displayed at the Norwegian pavilion. He spent his mornings at Bonnat's busy studio (which included female models) and afternoons at the exhibition, galleries, and museums (where students were expected to make copies as a way of learning technique and observation). Munch recorded little enthusiasm for Bonnat's drawing lessons—"It tires and bores me—it's numbing"—but enjoyed

4600-542: The Frieze of Life – A Poem about Life, Love and Death . Frieze of Life motifs, such as The Storm and Moonlight , are steeped in atmosphere. Other motifs illuminate the nocturnal side of love, such as Rose and Amelie and Love and Pain . In Death in the Sickroom , the subject is the death of his sister Sophie, which he re-worked in many future variations. The dramatic focus of the painting, portraying his entire family,

4715-648: The Marie Harriman Gallery in New York City in 1936. The Museum of Fine Arts, Boston , acquired it from the Marie Harriman Gallery on 16 April 1936. Critics thought of Paul Gauguin as one of the major artists of the time, but they were unsure about the artist's intentions in this work. Thadée Natanson of La Revue Blanche expressed confusion over its meaning, describing it as "obscure". The critic André Fontainas of

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4830-595: The Post-Impressionists , what evolved was a subject matter which was symbolist in content, depicting a state of mind rather than an external reality. In 1889, Munch presented his first one-man show of nearly all his works to date. The recognition it received led to a two-year state scholarship to study in Paris under French painter Léon Bonnat . Munch seems to have been an early critic of photography as an art form, and remarked that it "will never compete with

4945-512: The Royal School of Art and Design of Kristiania, one of whose founders was his distant relative Jacob Munch . His teachers were the sculptor Julius Middelthun and the naturalistic painter Christian Krohg . That year, Munch demonstrated his quick absorption of his figure training at the academy in his first portraits, including one of his father and his first self-portrait. In 1883, Munch took part in his first public exhibition and shared

5060-546: The "Happy House" and returned here almost every summer for the next 20 years. It was this place he missed when he was abroad and when he felt depressed and exhausted. "To walk in Åsgårdstrand is like walking among my paintings—I get so inspired to paint when I am here". In 1897 Munch returned to Kristiania, where he also received grudging acceptance—one critic wrote, "A fair number of these pictures have been exhibited before. In my opinion these improve on acquaintance." In 1899, Munch began an intimate relationship with Tulla Larsen,

5175-637: The 1895 pastel was exhibited at the Museum of Modern Art in New York from October 2012 to April 2013, and the 1893 pastel was exhibited at the Van Gogh Museum in Amsterdam in 2015. Additionally, Munch created a lithograph stone of the composition in 1895 from which several prints produced by Munch survive. Only approximately four dozen prints were made before the original stone was resurfaced by

5290-573: The 1930s and 1940s, the Nazis labeled Munch's work " degenerate art " (along with that of Picasso , Klee , Matisse , Gauguin and many other modern artists) and removed his 82 works from German museums. Adolf Hitler announced in 1937, "For all we care, those pre-historic Stone Age culture barbarians and art-stutterers can return to the caves of their ancestors and there can apply their primitive international scratching." Where Do We Come From%3F What Are We%3F Where Are We Going%3F The painting

5405-777: The Sick-Room ), whose pantomime of fixed postures signify various emotions; since each character embodies a single psychological dimension, as in The Scream , Munch's men and women began to appear more symbolic than realistic. He wrote, "No longer should interiors be painted, people reading and women knitting: there would be living people, breathing and feeling, suffering and loving." The Scream exists in four versions: two pastels (1893 and 1895) and two paintings (1893 and 1910). There are also several lithographs of The Scream (1895 and later). The 1895 pastel sold at auction on 2 May 2012 for US$ 119,922,500, including commission. It

5520-551: The Swedish dramatist August Strindberg , whom he painted, as he embarked on a major series of paintings he would later call The Frieze of Life , depicting a series of deeply-felt themes such as love, anxiety, jealousy and betrayal, steeped in atmosphere. The Scream was conceived in Kristiania. According to Munch, he was out walking at sunset, when he 'heard the enormous, infinite scream of nature'. The painting's agonized face

5635-523: The appearance of drips in his paintings, as first subtly seen in the painted version of "At the Deathbed"(1895). This effect resulted from the use of highly diluted paint and the deliberate inclusion of drips. Initially, this effect was visible at the edges of his work, but later, the drips became more central, as seen in "By the Deathbed" (1915). The effect of running paint was later adopted by many artists. His other paintings, including casino scenes, show

5750-461: The artist wrote on his canvas has no question mark, no dash, and all words are capitalized. In the upper right corner, he signed and dated the painting: P. Gauguin / 1897 . The painting is an accentuation of Gauguin's trailblazing Post-Impressionistic style; his art stressed the vivid use of colors and thick brushstrokes, while it aimed to convey an emotional or expressionistic strength. It emerged in conjunction with other avant-garde movements of

5865-421: The artist's sexual anxieties, though it could also be argued that they represent his turbulent relationship with love itself and his general pessimism regarding human existence. Many of these sketches and paintings were done in several versions, such as Madonna , Hands and Puberty , and also transcribed as wood-block prints and lithographs. Munch hated to part with his paintings because he thought of his work as

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5980-464: The background represents what Gauguin described as "the Beyond." Gauguin approaches the life cycle from a feminine perspective. The girl surrounded by kittens demonstrates the purity of "girlhood". The figure in the center is placed in a "Garden of Eden motif"; she is picking fruits from a tree. Gauguin intended to represent this woman as a sin, like the allegory of Eve . Maternity is represented through

6095-455: The brush and the palette, until such time as photographs can be taken in Heaven or Hell!" Munch's younger sister Laura was the subject of his 1899 interior Melancholy: Laura . Amanda O'Neill says of the work, "In this heated claustrophobic scene Munch not only portrays Laura's tragedy, but his own dread of the madness he might have inherited." Munch arrived in Paris during the festivities of

6210-578: The coming Fauvists , famous for their boldly false colors, likely saw his works and might have found inspiration in them. When the Fauves held their own exhibit in 1906, Munch was invited and displayed his works with theirs. After studying the sculpture of Rodin , Munch may have experimented with plasticine as an aid to design, but he produced little sculpture. During this time, Munch received many commissions for portraits and prints which improved his usually precarious financial condition. In 1906, he painted

6325-835: The contrary, the Ghostface mask worn by the primary antagonists of the Scream series of horror was not inspired by the Munch painting. The mask, discovered by Marianne Maddalena and Wes Craven , was created in 1991 by Brigitte Sleiertin of the Fun World novelty company for the Halloween market. She based her concept drawings on old cartoons, such as those created by Max Fleischer . Edvard Munch Edvard Munch ( / m ʊ ŋ k / MUUNK ; Norwegian: [ˈɛ̀dvɑɖ ˈmʊŋk] ; 12 December 1863 – 23 January 1944)

6440-456: The convicted, Bjørn Hoen and Petter Tharaldsen, were also ordered to pay compensation of 750 million kroner (roughly US$ 117.6 million or €86.7 million) to the City of Oslo. The Munch Museum was closed for ten months for a security overhaul. On 31 August 2006, Norwegian police announced that a police operation had recovered both The Scream and Madonna , but did not reveal detailed circumstances of

6555-491: The crime, the city government of Oslo offered a reward of 2 million Norwegian krone (roughly US$ 313,500 or €231,200) for information that could help locate the paintings. Although the paintings remained missing, six men went on trial in early 2006, variously charged with either helping to plan or participating in the robbery. Three of the men were convicted and sentenced to between four and eight years in prison in May 2006, and two of

6670-430: The daily existence of young adulthood; in the final group, according to the artist, "an old woman approaching death appears reconciled and resigned to her thoughts"; at her feet, "a strange white bird...represents the futility of words" or "the uselessness of vain words". Together, the painting from right to left suggests the cycle of "birth-sin-death". Outside of this cycle of life, there is a blue figure. The blue idol in

6785-475: The dead—my mother, my sister, my grandfather, my father...Kill yourself and then it's over. Why live?" Munch's paintings of the following year included sketchy tavern scenes and a series of bright cityscapes in which he experimented with the pointillist style of Georges Seurat . By 1892, Munch formulated his characteristic, and original, Synthetist style , as seen in Melancholy (1891), in which color

6900-668: The enormous, infinite scream of nature." He later described the personal anguish behind the painting, "for several years I was almost mad... You know my picture, 'The Scream?' I was stretched to the limit—nature was screaming in my blood... After that I gave up hope ever of being able to love again." In 2003, comparing the painting with other great works, art historian Martha Tedeschi wrote: Whistler's Mother , Wood's American Gothic , Leonardo da Vinci's Mona Lisa and Edvard Munch's The Scream have all achieved something that most paintings—regardless of their art historical importance, beauty, or monetary value—have not: they communicate

7015-473: The exhibition "Scream and Madonna – Revisited" at the Munch Museum in Oslo displayed the paintings together. In 2008 Idemitsu Petroleum Norge AS committed an endowment of 4 million Norwegian krone towards the conservation, research and presentation of The Scream and Madonna . The 1895 pastel-on-board version of the work, owned by Norwegian businessman Petter Olsen , sold at Sotheby's in London for

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7130-513: The exhibition closed. Munch was pleased with the "great commotion", and wrote in a letter: "Never have I had such an amusing time—it's incredible that something as innocent as painting should have created such a stir." In Berlin, Munch became involved in an international circle of writers, artists and critics, including the Swedish dramatist and leading intellectual August Strindberg , whom he painted in 1892. He also met Danish writer and painter Holger Drachmann , whom he painted in 1898. Drachmann

7245-552: The feeling that he had no right to get married." Munch almost gave in to Tulla, but fled from her in 1900, also turning away from her considerable fortune, and moved to Berlin. His Girls on the Jetty , created in 18 different versions, demonstrated the theme of feminine youth without negative connotations. In 1902, he displayed his works thematically at the hall of the Berlin Secession, producing "a symphonic effect—it made

7360-451: The figures that surround the baby. Along with the motherhood of a woman's life, Gauguin also displays the idea of "domestic submission" through the bracelet and collar worn by the mature woman on the left and the white goat, respectively. Finally, the state of seniority can be seen through the old woman on the left. Near the blissful people are two sorrowful women by a tree who stand in contrast with their surroundings. In front of these women

7475-649: The general public of Kristiania finally warmed to his work, and museums began to purchase his paintings. He was made a Knight of the Royal Order of St. Olav "for services in art". His first American exhibit was in 1912 in New York. As part of his recovery, Jacobson advised Munch to only socialize with good friends and avoid drinking in public . Munch followed this advice and in the process produced several full-length portraits of high quality of friends and patrons—honest portrayals devoid of flattery. He also created landscapes and scenes of people at work and play, using

7590-464: The image: I was walking along the road with two friends – the sun was setting – suddenly the sky turned blood red – I paused, feeling exhausted, and leaned on the fence – there was blood and tongues of fire above the blue-black fjord and the city – my friends walked on, and I stood there trembling with anxiety – and I sensed an infinite scream passing through nature. Some scholars believe, based upon these accounts, that Munch

7705-445: The influence of the bohemians or rather under Hans Jæger. Many people have mistakenly claimed that my ideas were formed under the influence of Strindberg and the Germans ... but that is wrong. They had already been formed by then." At that time, contrary to many of the other bohemians, Munch was still respectful of women, as well as reserved and well-mannered, but he began to give in to the binge drinking and brawling of his circle. He

7820-468: The inscription after the critical comments made when the painting was first exhibited in Norway in October 1895. There is good evidence that Munch was deeply hurt by that criticism, being sensitive to the mental illness that was prevalent in his family. The Scream has been the target of several thefts and theft attempts. Some damage has been suffered in these thefts. On 12 February 1994, the same day as

7935-437: The late twentieth century, The Scream was imitated, parodied, and (following the expiration of its copyright) outright copied, which led to it acquiring an iconic status in popular culture. It was used on the cover of some editions of Arthur Janov 's 1970 book The Primal Scream . In 1983–1984, pop artist Andy Warhol made a series of silk screen prints copying works by Munch, including The Scream . His stated intention

8050-454: The lower left corner, while Madonna suffered several tears on the right side of the painting as well as two holes in Madonna's arm. Before repairs and restoration began, the paintings were put on public display by the Munch Museum beginning 27 September 2006. During the five-day exhibition, 5,500 people viewed the damaged paintings. The conserved works went back on display on 23 May 2008, when

8165-399: The master's commentary during museum trips. Munch was enthralled by the vast display of modern European art, including the works of three artists who would prove influential: Paul Gauguin , Vincent van Gogh , and Henri de Toulouse-Lautrec —all notable for how they used color to convey emotion. Munch was particularly inspired by Gauguin's "reaction against realism" and his credo that "art

8280-574: The negative opinion of Munch's cousin Edvard Diriks (an established, traditional painter), destroyed at least one painting (likely a nude) and refused to advance any more money for art supplies. Munch also received his father's ire for his relationship with Hans Jæger , the local nihilist who lived by the code "a passion to destroy is also a creative passion" and who advocated suicide as the ultimate way to freedom. Munch came under his malevolent, anti-establishment spell. "My ideas developed under

8395-482: The newly formed Art Association, where he admired the work of the Norwegian landscape school. He returned to copy the paintings, and soon he began to paint in oils. Due in part to the mental health struggles and incarceration in an institution of his sister, Laura Catherine, and in part to then-prevailing beliefs in hereditary insanity, Edvard Munch often expressed his fear that he would become insane. Critics of his art also accused him of insanity, deploying this term in

8510-612: The old woman at the left in his 1897 painting Where Do We Come From? What Are We? Where Are We Going? . In 2004, Italian anthropologist Piero Mannucci speculated that Munch might have seen a mummy in Florence 's Museum of Natural History which bears an even more striking resemblance to the painting. However, later studies have disputed that theory, as Munch did not visit Florence until after painting The Scream . The imagery of The Scream has been compared to that which an individual suffering from depersonalization disorder experiences,

8625-634: The opening of the 1994 Winter Olympics in Lillehammer , two men broke into the National Gallery, Oslo, and stole its version of The Scream , leaving a note reading "Thanks for the poor security". The painting had been moved down to a second-story gallery as part of the Olympic festivities. After the gallery refused to pay a ransom demand of US$ 1 million in March 1994, Norwegian police set up

8740-402: The painting on behalf of France. Gabriel Frizeau  [ fr ] purchased the painting from Vollard for 2,500 francs in 1901. Subsequently, Frizeau sold the painting around 1913 to Galerie Barbazanges , which sold it before 1920 to the Norwegian ship owner and art collector Jørgen Breder Stang  [ no ] . He sold the painting via Alfred Gold in 1935, and it was bought by

8855-607: The painting via Alfred Gold in 1935, and it was bought by the Marie Harriman Gallery in New York City in 1936. The Museum of Fine Arts, Boston , acquired it from the Marie Harriman Gallery on 16 April 1936. Gauguin had been a student at the Petit Séminaire de La Chapelle-Saint-Mesmin , just outside Orléans , from the age of eleven to the age of sixteen. His studies there included a class in Catholic liturgy ;

8970-431: The pastel remains the fourth highest nominal price paid for a painting at auction. The work had a presale estimate of $ 80 million, the biggest presale estimate ever set by Sotheby's. In Philip K. Dick 's 1968 novel Do Androids Dream of Electric Sheep? , the main character and his partner, Phil Resch, view the painting in an art gallery. Resch comments that the painting reminds him of how he imagines androids feel. In

9085-589: The picture's inspiration. After the sale, Sotheby's auctioneer Tobias Meyer said the work was "worth every penny", adding: "It is one of the great icons of art in the world and whoever bought it should be congratulated." The auction was contested by the heirs of Hugo Simon , who sold it to Norwegian ship owner Thomas Olsen, Petter's father, "around 1937". The previous record for the most expensive work of art sold at auction had been held by Picasso's Nude, Green Leaves and Bust , which went for US$ 106.5 million at Christie's two years prior on 4 May 2010. As of 2018,

9200-501: The poster for the 1990 film Home Alone was inspired by The Scream . The principal alien antagonists depicted in the 2011 BBC series of Doctor Who , named " The Silence ", have an appearance partially based on The Scream . In 2013, The Scream was one of four paintings that the Norwegian postal service chose for a series of stamps marking the 150th anniversary of Edvard Munch's birth. In 2018 Norwegian comedy duo Ylvis made

9315-531: The printer in Munch's absence. The material composition of the 1893 painted version was examined in 2010. The pigment analysis revealed the use of cadmium yellow , vermilion , ultramarine and viridian , among other pigments in use in the 19th century. The version held by the National Museum of Norway has a pencil inscription, in small lettering, in the upper left corner, saying "Kan kun være malet af en gal Mand!" ("could only have been painted by

9430-534: The process of creating this painting, Gauguin experienced several difficult events in his personal life. He suffered from medical conditions including eczema, syphilis, and conjunctivitis. He faced financial challenges, and going into debt. He was also informed about the death of his daughter from Copenhagen. From one of many letters to his friend, Daniel de Monfreid, Gauguin disclosed his plan to commit suicide in December 1897. Before he did, however, he wanted to paint

9545-420: The recovery. The paintings were said to be in a better-than-expected condition. "We are 100 percent certain they are the originals," police chief Iver Stensrud told a news conference. "The damage was much less than feared." Munch Museum director Ingebjørg Ydstie confirmed the condition of the paintings, saying it was much better than expected and that the damage could be repaired. The Scream had moisture damage on

9660-569: The screen for an Ibsen play in the small Kammerspiele Theatre located in Berlin's Deutsches Theater , in which the Frieze of Life was hung. The theatre's director Max Reinhardt later sold it; it is now in the Berlin Nationalgalerie . After an earlier period of landscapes, in 1907 he turned his attention again to human figures and situations. In the autumn of 1908, Munch's anxiety, compounded by excessive drinking and brawling, had become acute. As he later wrote, "My condition

9775-449: The shooting and subsequent events. She finally left him and married a younger colleague of Munch. Munch took this as a betrayal, and he dwelled on the humiliation for some time to come, channeling some of the bitterness into new paintings. His paintings Still Life (The Murderess) and The Death of Marat I , done in 1906–07, clearly reference the shooting incident and the emotional after-effects. In 1903–04, Munch exhibited in Paris where

9890-467: The site depicted in the painting may have offered some inspiration. The scene was identified as being the view from a road overlooking Oslo, by the Oslofjord and Hovedøya , from the hill of Ekeberg . At the time of painting the work, Munch's manic depressive sister Laura Catherine was a patient at the mental asylum at the foot of Ekeberg. In 1978, the Munch scholar Robert Rosenblum suggested that

10005-514: The son of a priest. Christian was a doctor and medical officer who married Laura, a woman half his age, in 1861. Edvard had an elder sister, Johanne Sophie, and three younger siblings: Peter Andreas, Laura Catherine, and Inger Marie. Laura was artistically talented and may have encouraged Edvard and Sophie. Edvard was related to the painter Jacob Munch and the historian Peter Andreas Munch . The family moved to Oslo (then called Christiania and renamed Kristiania in 1877) in 1864 when Christian Munch

10120-419: The soul, that is to say the study of my own self". Munch wrote of how the painting came to be: "I was walking down the road with two friends when the sun set; suddenly, the sky turned as red as blood. I stopped and leaned against the fence, feeling unspeakably tired. Tongues of fire and blood stretched over the bluish black fjord. My friends went on walking, while I lagged behind, shivering with fear. Then I heard

10235-479: The strange, skeletal creature in the foreground of the painting was inspired by a Peruvian mummy , which Munch could have seen at the 1889 Exposition Universelle in Paris. This mummy, which was buried in a fetal position with its hands alongside its face, also struck the imagination of Paul Gauguin : it stood as a model for figures in more than twenty of Gauguin's paintings, among those the central figure in his painting Human misery (Grape harvest at Arles) and for

10350-470: The subject of the painting is one of the pictographs that was considered by the US Department of Energy for use as a non-language-specific symbol of danger to warn future human civilizations of the presence of radioactive waste . The cover art for the 2018 MGMT album Little Dark Age shows a figure resembling the subject of the painting, albeit in clown-like makeup. Despite popular opinion to

10465-451: The teacher for this class was the Bishop of Orléans , Félix-Antoine-Philibert Dupanloup . Dupanloup had devised his own catechism for students to lead them toward proper spiritual reflections on the nature of life . The three fundamental questions in this catechism were "where does humanity come from?" "where is it going to?", and "how does humanity proceed?" Although in later life Gauguin

10580-444: The threatening shapes of heavy trees and brooding houses. Munch portrayed women either as frail, innocent sufferers (see Puberty and Love and Pain ) or as the cause of great longing, jealousy and despair (see Separation , Jealousy , and Ashes ). Munch often uses shadows and rings of color around his figures to emphasize an aura of fear, menace, anxiety, or sexual intensity. These paintings have been interpreted as reflections of

10695-410: The time. He made a wooden frame with carved reliefs for the large painting Metabolism (1898), initially called Adam and Eve . This work reveals Munch's pre-occupation with the "fall of man" and his pessimistic philosophy of love. Motifs such as The Empty Cross and Golgotha (both c.  1900 ) reflect a metaphysical orientation, and also reflect Munch's pietistic upbringing. The entire Frieze

10810-616: The twentieth century, including Cubism and Fauvism . In 1898, Gauguin sent the painting to Georges-Daniel de Monfreid in Paris . Monfreid passed it to Ambroise Vollard along with eight other thematically related pictures shipped earlier. They went on view at the Galerie Vollard from November 17 to December 10 1898. The exhibition was a success, although D'où Venons Nous? received mixed reviews. Charles Morice  [ fr ] unsuccessfully tried to raise funds to purchase

10925-459: The vivid ghost stories helped inspire his macabre visions and nightmares; he felt that death was constantly approaching. One of Munch's younger sisters, Laura, was diagnosed with mental illness at an early age. Of the five siblings, only Andreas married, but he died a few months after the wedding. Munch would later write, "I inherited two of mankind's most frightful enemies—the heritage of consumption and insanity ." Christian Munch's military pay

11040-506: The winters and kept out of school, Edvard would draw to keep himself occupied. He was tutored by his school mates and his aunt. Christian Munch also instructed his son in history and literature, and entertained the children with vivid ghost-stories and the tales of the American writer Edgar Allan Poe . As Edvard remembered it, Christian's positive behavior towards his children was overshadowed by his morbid pietism . Munch wrote, "My father

11155-446: Was Walther Rathenau , later the German foreign minister , who strongly contributed to his success. Despite over half of his painted works being landscapes, Munch is rarely seen as a landscape artist. However, Munch had a fixation on several elements of nature that resulted in recurrent motifs throughout his work. The shoreline and the forest are both significant settings of Munch's work. A focus on Munch's use of nature to convey emotion

11270-612: Was 17 years Munch's senior and a drinking companion at Zum schwarzen Ferkel (At the Black Piglet) in 1893–94. In 1894 Drachmann wrote of Munch: "He struggles hard. Good luck with your struggles, lonely Norwegian." During his four years in Berlin, Munch sketched out most of the ideas that would be comprised in his major work, The Frieze of Life , first designed for book illustration but later expressed in paintings. He sold little, but made some income from charging entrance fees to view his controversial paintings. Munch began allowing

11385-785: Was a Norwegian painter. His 1893 work The Scream has become one of Western art's most acclaimed images. His childhood was overshadowed by illness, bereavement and the dread of inheriting a mental condition that ran in the family. Studying at the Royal School of Art and Design in Kristiania (today's Oslo), Munch began to live a bohemian life under the influence of the nihilist Hans Jæger , who urged him to paint his own emotional and psychological state (' soul painting '); from this emerged his distinctive style. Travel brought new influences and outlets. In Paris , he learned much from Paul Gauguin , Vincent van Gogh and Henri de Toulouse-Lautrec , especially their use of color. In Berlin , he met

11500-475: Was an expressive painter and was not primarily interested in literal renderings of what he had seen. Another explanation for the red skies is that they are due to the appearance of nacreous clouds which occur at the latitude of Norway and which look remarkably similar to the skies depicted in The Scream . Alternatively, it has been suggested that the proximity of both a slaughterhouse and a lunatic asylum to

11615-447: Was appointed medical officer at Akershus Fortress . In 1868 Edvard's mother died of tuberculosis , probably aggravated by the exhaustion of five consecutive pregnancies in seven years, imposed on her by her religious husband. Munch's favourite sister, Johanne Sophie, also died of tuberculosis, at the age of 15, in 1877. After their mother's death, the Munch siblings were raised by their father and by their aunt Karen. Often ill for much of

11730-541: Was cheered by his increasing acceptance by the people of Kristiania and exposure in the city's museums. His later years were spent working in peace and privacy. Although his works were banned in Nazi-occupied Europe, most of them survived World War II , securing him a legacy. Edvard Munch was born in a farmhouse in the village of Ådalsbruk in Løten , Norway , to Laura Catherine Bjølstad and Christian Munch,

11845-533: Was describing a terrifying emotional experience that would today be called a panic attack . Among theories advanced to account for the reddish sky in the background is the artist's memory of the effects of the powerful volcanic eruption of Krakatoa , which deeply tinted sunset skies red in parts of the Western hemisphere for months during 1883 and 1884, about a decade before Munch painted The Scream . This explanation has been disputed by scholars, who note that Munch

11960-467: Was exhibited the same year, alongside other artworks in a series which Munch called The Frieze of Life . It is in the collection of the National Museum of Norway in Oslo. This is the version that has the barely visible pencil inscription "Kan kun være malet af en gal Mand!" ("could only have been painted by a madman"). A pastel version from that year, which may have been a preliminary study,

12075-413: Was his first "soul painting", his first break from Impressionism. The painting received a negative response from critics and from his family, and caused another "violent outburst of moral indignation" from the community. Only his friend Christian Krohg defended him: He paints, or rather regards, things in a way that is different from that of other artists. He sees only the essential, and that, naturally,

12190-579: Was human work and not an imitation of Nature", a belief earlier stated by Whistler . As one of his Berlin friends said later of Munch, "he need not make his way to Tahiti to see and experience the primitive in human nature. He carries his own Tahiti within him." Influenced by Gauguin, as well as the etchings of German artist Max Klinger , Munch experimented with prints as a medium to create graphic versions of his works. In 1896 he created his first woodcuts—a medium that proved ideal to Munch's symbolic imagery. Together with his contemporary Nikolai Astrup , Munch

12305-691: Was shown for the first time at the secessionist exhibition in Berlin in 1902. "The Frieze of Life" themes recur throughout Munch's work but he especially focused on them in the mid-1890s. In sketches, paintings, pastels and prints, he tapped the depths of his feelings to examine his major motifs: the stages of life, the femme fatale, the hopelessness of love, anxiety, infidelity, jealousy, sexual humiliation, and separation in life and death. These themes are expressed in paintings such as The Sick Child (1885), Love and Pain (retitled Vampire ; 1893–94), Ashes (1894), and The Bridge . The latter shows limp figures with featureless or hidden faces, over which loom

12420-500: Was stolen on 22 August 2004, during daylight hours, when masked gunmen entered the Munch Museum in Oslo and stole it and Munch's Madonna . A bystander photographed the robbers as they escaped to their car with the artwork. On 8 April 2005, Norwegian police arrested a suspect in connection with the theft, but the paintings remained missing and it was rumored that they had been burned by the thieves to destroy evidence. On 1 June 2005, with four suspects already in custody in connection with

12535-407: Was temperamentally nervous and obsessively religious—to the point of psychoneurosis . From him I inherited the seeds of madness. The angels of fear, sorrow, and death stood by my side since the day I was born." Christian reprimanded his children by telling them that their mother was looking down from heaven and grieving over their misbehavior. The oppressive religious milieu, Edvard's poor health, and

12650-490: Was to desacralize the painting by making it into a mass-reproducible object. Munch had already begun that process, however, by making a lithograph of the work for reproduction. Erró 's ironic and irreverent treatment of Munch's masterpiece in his acrylic paintings The Second Scream (1967) and Ding Dong (1979) is considered a characteristic of post-modern art. The expression of Kevin McCallister ( Macaulay Culkin ) in

12765-541: Was unsettled by the sexual revolution going on at the time and by the independent women around him. He later turned cynical concerning sexual matters, expressed not only in his behavior and his art, but in his writings as well, an example being a long poem called The City of Free Love . After numerous experiments, Munch concluded that the Impressionist idiom did not allow sufficient expression. He found it superficial and too akin to scientific experimentation. He felt

12880-516: Was verging on madness—it was touch and go." Subject to hallucinations and feelings of persecution, he entered the clinic of Daniel Jacobson. The therapy Munch received for the next eight months included diet and "electrification" (a treatment then fashionable for nervous conditions, not to be confused with electroconvulsive therapy ). Munch's stay in hospital stabilized his personality, and after returning to Norway in 1909, his work became more colorful and less pessimistic. Further brightening his mood,

12995-451: Was very low, and his attempts to develop a private side practice failed, keeping his family in genteel but perennial poverty. They moved frequently from one cheap flat to another. Munch's early drawings and watercolors depicted these interiors, and the individual objects, such as medicine bottles and drawing implements, plus some landscapes. By his teens, art dominated Munch's interests. At 13, Munch had his first exposure to other artists at

13110-415: Was vociferously anticlerical, these questions from Dupanloup's catechism had lodged in his mind, and "where?" became the key question that Gauguin asked in his art. Looking for a society more simple and elemental than that of his native France, Gauguin left for Tahiti in 1891. In addition to several other paintings that express his highly individualistic mythology, he completed this painting in 1897. During

13225-419: Was walking along a path, the city was on one side and the fjord below. I felt tired and ill. I stopped and looked out over the fjord – the sun was setting, and the clouds turning blood red. I sensed a scream passing through nature; it seemed to me that I heard the scream. I painted this picture, painted the clouds as actual blood. The color shrieked. This became The Scream . He later described his inspiration for

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