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Biography
Born on December 12th, 1863, Loten, Norway, Munch grew up in Christiania (now Oslo). He was related to painter Jacob Munch (1776 – 1839) and historian Peter Andreas Munch (1810 – 1863). After the death of his mother, Laura Catherine Bjolstad, of tuberculosis in 1868, Munch was raised by his father, Christian Munch, until 1889 when his father died. Christian Munch instilled in his children a deep-rooted fear of hell by repeatedly telling them that if they sinned, in any way, they would be doomed to hell without chance of pardon. While Munch was still young, his mother, a brother and Munch's favorite sister Sophie (in 1877) died. A younger sister was diagnosed with mental illness at an early age. Munch was also often ill. Of the five siblings only Andreas married, only to die a few months after the wedding. This may explain the bleakness and pessimism of much of Munch's work. He would later say, "Sickness, insanity and death were the angels that surrounded my cradle and they have followed me throughout my life." A number of modern sources have described Munch's illness as probably being bipolar disorder.
In 1879, Munch enrolled in a technical college to study engineering, but frequent illnesses interrupted his studies. In 1880, he left the college to become a painter. In 1881, he enrolled at the Royal School of Art and Design of Kristiania. His teachers were sculptor Julius Middelthun and naturalistic painter Christian Krohg.
Munch traveled to Paris in 1885, and his work began to show the influence of French painters — first of the impressionists, and then of the postimpressionists and of art nouveau design. While stylistically influenced by the postimpressionists, Munch's subject matter is symbolist in content, depicting a state of mind rather than an external reality. (continued on the bottom)
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Munch maintained that the impressionism idiom did not suit his art. Interested in portraying not a random slice of reality, but situations brimming with emotional content and expressive energy, Munch carefully calculated his compositions to create a tense atmosphere.
The first autumn, shortly after Munch arrived in France, he was informed that his father had died. The loneliness and melancholy in the painting "Night" (1890) are often seen with this in mind. The dark interior with the lonely figure at the window is completely dominated by tones of blue - a painting of nuances which may be reminiscent of James McNeill Whistler's nocturnal colour harmonies. This modern and independent work is also an expression of the "decadence" in the final decade of the century.
During the 1890s, Munch favoured a shallow pictorial space, and used it in his frequently frontal figures. Since he chose the poses to produce the most convincing images of states of mind and psychological conditions (Ashes), the figures lend to the paintings' a monumental, static quality. Munch's figures appear to play roles on a theatre stage (Death in the Sick-Room), even perhaps a pantomime of fixed postures signifying the emotions. Because he gave his characters only one psychological dimension, as in The Scream, Munch's men and women do not seem realistic.
In 1892, the Union of Berlin Artists invited Munch to exhibit at its November exhibition. His paintings invoked bitter controversy at the show, and after one week the exhibition closed. In Berlin, Munch involved himself in an international circle of writers, artists and critics, including the Norwegian playwright Henrik Ibsen (Munch designed the sets for several Ibsen's plays), and the Swedish dramatist August Strindberg.
In December 1893 Munch had an exhibition at Unter den Linden where he showed, among other things, six paintings entitled "Study for a Series: Love". This was the beginning of a cycle he would later call the "Frieze of Life - A Poem about Life, Love and Death". It includes motifs that are steeped in atmosphere such as "The Storm", "Moonlight" and "Starry Night", where one dimly perceives the influence of Arnold Böcklin. Other motifs illuminate the nocturnal side of love, such as "Rose and Amelie" and "Vampire". Several pictures have death as a theme: "Death in the Sickroom" (1893) created quite a stir. In this composition Munch's debt to the French Synthetists and Symbolists is obvious. Painted in garish and pallid colours, the picture shows a scene frozen fast like the tragic final tableau in a drama. The motif is based on the memory of his sister Sophie's death, and the whole family is represented. The dramatic focus in the picture is on the figure who represents Munch himself. The following year the "Frieze of Life" was enlarged by motifs such as "Anxiety", "Ashes", "Madonna" and "Women in Three Stages", the latter a monumental motif completely in keeping with the spirit of Symbolism.
Between 1892 and 1908, Munch divided his time between Paris and Berlin, where he became known for his etchings, his lithographs, and his woodcuts. While in Berlin at the turn of the century, Munch experimented with a variety of new media (photography, lithography, and woodcuts), in many instances re-working his older imagery. The Fauvists, led by Matisse, shared many of Munch's new artistic approaches. The "Die Brücke" group in Dresden was interested in Munch, but they did not succeed in getting him to show his paintings at their exhibitions.
In the autumn of 1908, Munch's anxiety became acute and he entered the clinic of Dr. Daniel Jacobsen. The therapy Munch received in hospital changed his personality, and after returning to Norway in 1909, he showed more interest in nature subjects, and his work became more colorful and less pessimistic.
In the 1930s and 1940s, German Nazis labeled his work "degenerate art", and removed his work from German museums. This deeply hurt the antifascist Munch, who had come to feel Germany was his second homeland.
Munch died in Ekely, near Oslo, on January 23, 1944, about a month after his 80th birthday. He left 1,000 paintings, 15,400 prints, 4,500 drawings and watercolors, and six sculptures to the city of Oslo, which built the Munch Museum at Tøyen in his honor. The museum houses the broadest collection of his works. His works are also represented in major museums and galleries in Norway and abroad.
Munch appears on the Norwegian 1,000 Kroner note along with pictures inspired by his artwork.
"From my rotting body, flowers shall grow and I am in them and that is eternity."
—Edvard Munch