Meaning of the Painting The Scream by Edvard Munch

The Scream is a work of the Norwegian painter Edvard Munch, whose original title is Skrik (scream in English). Due to its expressive force, this painting is considered an antecedent of the expressionist movement. The Scream It is the most famous painting by Munch, who made different versions of it over the years.

The original and most famous version, completed in 1893, is in the National Gallery in Oslo, Norway. Two other versions are in the Munch Museum in the same city; and a fourth, recently sold at auction at a record price, belongs to a private collection.

Analysis and meaning of painting The Scream

The painting The Scream it has become a cultural icon. It is one of the most recognized images in the world, as it has been incorporated into popular culture, and has been widely parodied by recent artists. But what does the painting represent? What is the story of The Scream by Edvard Munch? What was the author inspired by?

What does the painting represent The Scream?

From the iconographic point of view, The Scream It presents an androgynous figure in the foreground with a gesture of anguish that conveys great expressiveness and psychological strength.

The scene you are in is a fenced-in path leading off in diagonal perspective. In the background, you can see two figures with hats that seem oblivious to what happens with the main figure.

In the frame The Scream by Munch, warm background colors prevail. In the sky, fluid and swirling, orange tones predominate. The path and the landscape, on the other hand, seem illuminated by a semi-dark light. The shapes are twisted and the colors are arranged in an arbitrary way.

Rather than transpose reality, colors seek to express a feeling of anguish and despair, most vividly reflected in the foreground figure, in the intensity of his gesture of tribulation and terror.

The theme of rhythm and vibration is very important on this canvas. Some argue that the greatest attributed achievement of the work is the way Muncho captured the dimension of sound through visual rhythm.

In fact, one of the oldest debates surrounding this painting is whether the figure screams or hears a scream. For some specialists, the character in the foreground would be reacting to a scream and not emitting one. It would, therefore, be an expression of the disturbance that this scream generates in the subject.

In any case, in this painting it has been used to recognize the existential anguish of modern man in the transition from the 19th century, from great technological advances, to the 20th century; his feeling of loneliness and despondency, his despair. Likewise, the painting has been interpreted as a symbol of the artist's condition as a deeply tormented man. Other interpretations suggest that the work represents the cry of nature, personified in the figure in the foreground.

History of the painting The Scream

The inspiration for this painting apparently came from an afternoon when Edvard Munch was strolling together with two friends by a viewpoint on the Ekeberg hill, from where you could appreciate the landscape of Oslo. Munch writes in his diary in 1891:

He was walking down the street with two friends when the sun went down. Suddenly, the sky turned blood red and I felt a shudder of sadness. A piercing pain in the chest (...) Tongues of fire like blood covered the black and blue fjord and the city. My friends kept walking and I just stood there, shaking with fear. And I heard an endless scream go through nature.

Picture Despair (1892), prior to The Scream, portrays precisely that moment. In it, a man with a top hat on his side appears in the foreground, in a contemplative attitude, in a similar setting.

However, Munch continued to experiment, and painted a new painting, with the same title, in which represents a man who shows his face in a more desperate attitude, in the middle of a scene more bleak.

Not satisfied with the previous paintings, Munch continued painting, in search of what would be his masterpiece. He then tried an androgynous figure, who is facing the front and puts his hands to his head with an expression of deep anguish, which seems to emit (or hear?) A cry.

In the following years, Munch would test new variants of this painting, and he gets to paint four different versions. The original painting would be exhibited in 1893 as part of a set of six paintings entitled Love, which represented the different phases of an idyll. The Scream it had been conceived with the idea of ​​placing him in the last stage, that of anguish and despair.

One of the versions of The Scream It was auctioned in May 2012 in New York City. The winner of the auction paid a price of 119.9 million dollars, which is one of the highest figures paid for an artistic work throughout history.

Robberies

In recent years, two of the versions of work The Scream have been stolen. In February 1994, the most famous version was stolen, which is in the National Gallery in Oslo. However, eight weeks later she was recovered.

In August 2004, the 1910 version that was on display at the Munch Museum was stolen. It was only recovered two years later.

It may interest you: Edvard Munch: 20 works to understand the father of expressionism.

Edvard Munch biography

Edvard Munch (1863-1944) was a Norwegian painter and printmaker whose works had a notable influence on German Expressionism in the early 20th century.

His works are characterized by reflecting the anguish and despair of modern man. In them themes such as loneliness, eroticism, anguish or death are represented.

Despite being influenced by Symbolism and Impressionism, Edvard Munch is considered one of the forerunners of Expressionism.

Among his main works are The Scream (1893), Madonna (1894-1895) and Anxiety (1894), among many others.