The dynamic field of art has experienced a major turnaround when the Norwegian painter Edvard Munch started capturing his emotions through his masterpieces. Esteemed as the pioneer of the Expressionist Movement during the early 20th Century, Edvard Munch paintings have influenced revolutionized the messages delivered by each brushstroke by making them jump out of the dimensions and connect to its audience. It has been art that became a solace for his tortured soul due to early childhood experiences that needed to be vented out: the death of his mother Laura and sister Sophie from tuberculosis at an early age, as well as the catastrophic death of Christian, his father, several years later. He has, in the years that followed, produced a varying series for a painting called “The Sick Child” which was heavily inspired with his sister’s death.
Some famous paintings of Edvard Munch:
 |
Pain, anguish, sorrow, stress and other deep human feelings were evident in his The Frieze of Life – A Poem about Life, Love and Death, a series then composed of six Edvard Munch paintings displayed in a Berlin art exhibit that have caused much upheaval among the local authorities. The unorthodox theme and expression from Munch brought a controversial termination of the event. While the authorities deemed the collection as terrifying, it was successful in terms of elevating Edvard Munch paintings from mere pieces of canvass to an art that has provided an insightful mirror of his torment. And as if the previous tragedies were not enough, Munch has experienced another series of events that has become too much to cope with considering his emotional scars – another brother Andreas had died, a love affair ended, and a physical injury to a finger in his left hand. These events, plus the influence of drinking, have caused the artist to be hospitalizes in 1908 due to severe depression and anxiety attack which affected his works by becoming more imagery rather than focusing on human emotions.
With the additional turmoil, The Frieze of Life has also expanded and continuously made a name for him, becoming commissioned with dealers for this new wave of art expression which has also conquered the American scene with Edvard Munch paintings. As he was increasingly gaining recognition, a few decades after, Munch found himself again facing the tragic loss of another sister (Laura), the aunt who took care of the household when his mother died (Karen Bjolstad), and an eye affliction which is to affect him for the rest of his life.
In the last four years of his life, Munch has left the art mainstream although he did continue to paint. Canvasses are not his only outlet as he also extended his emotions in sculptures. With his death as the year 1944 started, Munch has bequeathed all his work to his beloved hometown, the city of Oslo. In commemoration of his great works and contribution to art, a museum called The Munch-museet was opened in 1963. The world will remember him most notably for his painting called “The Scream,” part of The Frieze of Life made in 1893 due to the distortions and exaggeration in the images that powerfully conveyed fear and angst experienced by the figure under a bloody sky. Edvard Munch paintings are the most appropriate benchmark of the era of Expressionism.