Edvard Munch (1863 – 1944)
Norwegian Symbolist painter and printmaker, and an important forerunner of the Expressionistic art movement.
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No longer shall I paint interiors with men reading and women knitting. I will paint living people who breathe and feel and suffer and love.
When seen as a whole, art derives from a person’s desire to communicate himself to another. I do not believe in an art which is not forced into existence by a human being’s desire to open his heart. All art, literature, and music must be born in your heart’s blood. Art is your heart’s blood.
My art is rooted in a single reflection: why am I not as others are? ... my art gives meaning to my life.
Without fear and disease, my life would be like a boat without oars.
Could only have been painted by a madman.
From my rotting body, flowers shall grow and I am in them and that is eternity.
I was walking along a path 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.
I painted from memory... the impressions of my childhood.
One night I was walking along a lane, on one side stood the town and underneath the Fjord, I was tired and sick. I stopped to look beyond the fjord — the sun was getting down — the clouds were tinged with a blood-red, I heard a cry to cross Nature: I almost thought of hearing it. I painted this picture, I painted the clouds like true blood. Colours were crying
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