Edvard Munch: The Life of an Artist

hello my name is Paul Priestley welcome to artists in school the home of art history for young people and for interested amateurs today we're going to be looking at the life and work of the great Norwegian artist Edvard Munch his work is full of passion and angst it's wonderful Edvard Munch was born on the 12th of December 1863 in lerton in Norway the son of dr. Christian munch and his wife Laura he had three sisters Sophie Laura Inger and a brother called andreas but family life was very difficult for Edvard because in 1868 at the age of five his mother died of tuberculosis as a result his father sank into deep depression so Karen his wife's sister took over the running and management of the house the tragedy was compounded when in 1877 monkeys sister Sophie also died of tuberculosis she was 15 years old he was just 14 and if that was not enough his younger sister Laura had mental issues in her teenage years and spent a large part of her life institutionalized in a mental hospital it is not surprising therefore that sickness and death left a permanent mark on monkeys childhood particularly the death of his sister Sophie whose suffering he later expressed in his painting the sick child these family issues contributed to Munch's own on-off struggles with mental illness and alcoholism as well as providing the inspiration for some of his most influential paintings monks left school at the age of 16 and decided to study engineering but the following year he quit his studies after deciding he wanted to become a painter in early 1881 he began to attend the Kristiania drawing Academy and also sold his first two paintings a couple of years later he rented a studio in Kristiania now known as Oslo with six other art students they were looking enough to receive support and instruction from the naturalistic painter and illustrator Cristian Korg initially monkeys work was heavily influenced by crog's naturalistic paintings but munch exhibited at the Oslo autumn exhibition for the first time in 1883 and in 1885 showed work the Antwerp world exhibition during this period he worked on three major paintings the day after puberty and the sick child it was also around this time he had his first true relationship with Miller phthalo the wife of a distant cousin he was infatuated with her but she ended the relationship abruptly after two years leaving him tormented and desolate nevertheless in 1886 munch showed several paintings including the sick child at the Oslo autumn exhibition and the public were horrified it is difficult to understand now why the painting provokes such a violent and angry response when it was first shown today the subject seems quite conventional but notice the use of complementary color the red of the hair clashing with the Greens of the dress you'll also notice from now on in most of munches paintings he abandons the use of localized color and uses primary and complementary colors instead because these colors combinations have a much greater expressive power what perhaps is more significant is that monk became increasingly reluctant to paint realistic backgrounds so his figures seem to be in some sort of indeterminate space this is interesting because it makes us focus much more on the psychology the thoughts and the emotions of the figures unless on that particular situation later in 1889 munch had his first solo exhibition in Oslo it was very successful and led to munch being offered a state grant to study drawing with Leone bana in Paris but shortly after arriving in France Munch's father died and his grief pushed him into a deep depression and heavy drinking so so it was not able to paint for months however in 1890 he moved back to Oslo and painted spring day on the Carl your ham Street this was very much influenced by Sir Arthur list neo-impressionists style but you'll notice is in patients with serious scientific pointillist approach as the figures in the middle are not painted in this style after a brief spell in Nice convalescing from a bout of rheumatic fever Munk returned to Paris and took a room at the 49 ruler Fayette and there in May 1891 he painted another of his impressionist works ruler Fayette munched later described the work as a brief revival of my impressionist period it's probably a view from the balcony of munches room in 1892 monks returned home to Norway and he spent the summer in Astra guard painting later that year at the end of October he exhibited 55 paintings in Berlin but was shocked by the an antagonistic with reception he received from both the public and the press who couldn't even spell his name right referring him to to him as blunt and not Munsch as a result the exhibition closed after a week but it was not all bad because the news of the scandal of the exhibition closing early led to the exhibition going on tour to cologne düsseldorf and surprisingly it was back in Berlin by the end of the year with a much better reception the next year or so munch stayed in Berlin he managed to sell enough paintings to scrape a living whilst working on what would become his most famous series of paintings the frieze of life the frieze of life was a series of paintings which were very much influenced by his own experiences the paintings explored life love death and would occupy munch for many years it was during this year 1893 he created his most famous painting The Scream which is an integral part of his frieze of life there are over 50 versions of The Scream painting some prints other than the painting that is on display in the National Gallery in Oslo the scream represents and deals with fear and loneliness of man in a natural setting in machs diary there is an entry which describes the event on which the painting is based it reads I was walking with friends when the song began to set and suddenly the sky turned blood-red I paused feeling exhausted and leaned on a fence there was blood and tongues of fire above the blue dark fjord and the city my friends walked on and there I stood trembling with fear and I sensed the endless scream passing through nature during the next couple of years he continued to work on the frieze of Life completing several important paintings in this work the ashes we can see the breakdown of a love affair but the painting also explores the psychology of the moment the figures appear to be suspended in an eloquent gestures which are difficult to put into words yet we understand them perfectly another work melancholy explores jealousy a theme monk monk often studies in the bohemian Society of Oslo in the 1890s free love was often advocated polygamous relationships were created resulting in intense jealousies this is reflected in the painting note the two figures in the background about to embark on a short trip together to a deserted island and contrast them with a third figure in the foreground in the painting the deathbed notice the patient no longer is the focal point of the painting instead the focus moves to the hands and the heads of the family at his bedside they are all linked together in grief by this huge black shadow it may be significant that monkeys younger brother andreas died of pneumonia the year before this deathbed painting was produced these paintings of death form the final part of the frieze of Life the series of paintings was first exhibited under the name the frieze of life in Berlin in 1902 but in later shows in Leipzig Oslo Prague monk included new paintings in 1898 monk met the woman who would become his cool muse tula Larsson was the wealthy daughter of one of leading wine merchants from the very start she pursued him aggressively and their relationship began much against his will he fled to Berlin and Paris but she pursued him he'd refused to meet her but always seemed to give in in fact he memorialized the relationship in this painting the dance of life on the left we can see the innocent woman in white looking forward to life in the middle a sensuous woman dancing with the man her red dress almost encircling him and an anguished woman in black on the right all three resemble Tula Larsson and the girls dancing in the background may also remember resemble her to the man in the foreground appears to be munch tula Larson longed to marry munch but he once wrote that the touch of a narrow clammy lips was like the kiss of a corpse eventually though in 1902 after munch had lost their pre marriage documents he escaped to Italy men Berlin where despite heavy drinking he finished the freeze of life but the saga was not over after disappearing for a year tula Larsson suddenly reappeared claiming her break from munch had left her suicidal and depressed munch reluctantly agreed to see her but there was an argument which somehow resulted in munch shooting himself he actually just lost the tip of his finger which he later described as a monstrosity that everybody stared at as a result he never showed his hand in public again or in painting always ensuring he wore gloves a few months after the incident Tula Larson married another artist in 1904 munch exhibited with the Berlin and Viennese secessions the following year he spent the winter in Germany to calm his nerves and combat is drinking but in the autumn of 1908 Munsch collapsed in Copenhagen he was persuaded to check himself into a private sanatorium on the outskirts of the city because he was hallucinating and was partially paralyzed down his left side after six months in hospital is drinking reduced and he regained most of his mental stability it was keen to get back to painting but he was now alone the tumultuously fee had laid was now behind him and a new phase of isolation began in his life as a result after 1908 a lot of his work doesn't seem to have the same poignancy drama as psychological impact as paintings completed before that date monks returned to Norway in 1909 and rented a house in Calgon where he began work on the murals for the Great Hall of Oslo University which he completed around 1916 the centrepiece of the installation was the painting the Sun it was a massive canvas more than seven meters wide the Sun is depicted as all persuasive shining from the heavens on the land and sea its rays providing all sources of life mush was nearly sixty in 1921 when he was commissioned to paint a frieze of 12 large paintings for the freer Chocolate Factory in Oslo by the factory's founder johann thrown Holst the paintings were installed in the women's canteen in 1923 thrown Holst had decided that for the female workers only the best was good enough so he got Norway's greatest painter munch to decorate their canteen with women as the main characters the paintings depict everyday scenes from the resort towns on Norway's East Coast months received the equivalent of 10,000 euros for his work in 1916 munch brought a former plant nursery called a Curley estate in scale on the outskirts of Oslo he lived at a cliff for the next 28 years until his death the estate consisted of 11 acres of fields apple trees bushy shrubs and several large outdoor studios in 1919 he caught Spanish flu but survived and commissioned an architect to build him yet another large studio during its construction many of the construction workers became subjects of a number of his paintings during the 1930s painting became more difficult because monk contracted an eye disease but in 1933 on the occasion of his 70th birthday he was awarded the Grand Cross of the Order of Saint Olaf and three years later saw his first exhibition in England 1937 saw the Nazis label 82 of monkeys paintings as degenerate and removed them from exhibition in Germany they would eventually repatriated to Norway where they were auctioned off German forces invaded Norway in 1940 but Muntz refused to have anything to do with the occupation forces locking himself aware akley he embarked on a number of unflinchingly revealing self portraits which explore the theme of an old man facing the prospect of death in the months before he died munch painted self-portrait between the clock and the bed ironically he looks like a man who has held himself back from the dance of life he appears awkwardly squashed between the grandfather clock and the bed and looking as though he shouldn't be occupying the space on the 12th of December 1943 tributes poured in for his 80th birthday but he was suffering from a severe cold which he failed to recover from munch died peacefully in his sleep on the 23rd of January 1944 in his will he left his NSTAR entire estate to the city of Oslo his bequest consisted of 1,150 paintings 17,000 prints for now a thousand watercolors and drawings and 13 sculptures as well as writings and literary notes the collection formed the basis of the egg van Munch Museum which opened in Oslo in 1963 to celebrate the centenary of Eva's birth thank you for watching I hope you've really enjoyed learning about the great Norwegian artist Edvard Munch if you have enjoyed the video perhaps you could give it a like maybe you could even subscribe that would be wonderful details of my channel are down here at the bottom of the screen if you want to help in the production of these videos then you can sponsor me through my patreon channel where you'll get lots of interesting wards in return that will be wonderful thank you for watching I'll see you again [Music]

Channel: Art History School

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Keywords: Norwegian painter Edvard Munch, Edvard Munch The Scream, edvard munch documentary, Munch The Dance of Life, Edvard Munch The Frieze of life, Norway, artist, death in the sick room painting, Freia chocolate factory, Edvard Munch biography, Paul Priestley, Ekely, expressionist painter, expressionism, famous artist, munch, artist in school, edvard munch paintings, Edvard Munch, the scream, art history, edvard munch (visual artist), Learn about edvard munch

Id: aTNjaICaCyE

Length: 18min 5sec (1085 seconds)

Published: Mon Jun 03 2019

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[u/alllie]

Edvard Munch biography: This video discusses the life and times of the Norwegian expressionist artist Edvard Munch. Death, love and angst are prominent themes he explored through out his life. The famous artist Edvard Munch was born in Loten in Norway, but lost his mother and sister at a young age. Edvard Munch is perhaps most famous for his paintings, The Scream, Death in the Sick Room, but his series of paintings, The Frieze of Life contains many remarkable paintings such as the Dance of Life. Munch suffered from bouts of mental illness and alcoholism, both issues are often reflected in his work. He also did a series of paintings for Oslo University, in Norway and for the Freia Chocolate Factory also in Oslo. The latter years of his life were spent in his estate at Ekely, Norway painting many self portraits which explored the effects of old age. Edvard Munch died in 1944 at the age of 80.