Critical Analysis on The Scream

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Expressive Arts

GCSE year 10

Critical Analysis on The Scream By Edvard Munch

 Edvard Munch was born on December 12 1863 in Loten Norway. He moved to Christiana, and spent most of his childhood there. Both his mother and his oldest sister suffered from tuberculosis and died before he reached the age of 14. At 18 he became more serious about his art and started attending art school. Edvard finally found a release for the pain he felt from his sister’s death. In 1886 he painted “The Sick Child”. The painting was so emotionally charged that it received a lot of criticism from the press and the public. However some of his artist colleagues began to recognize his talent. The same year another tragedy struck. His father died in November. Edvard received some scholarships that allowed him to spend the next few years in Paris. Although he would return to Norway during the summer, his style was that of a French Impressionist. In 1892 Munch submitted a series of paintings into a major Berlin art show. His exhibit was titled “The Frieze of Life”. This show caused an even larger uproar than his previous work. Edvard became a celebrity overnight and he painted such paintings as “the sick child” “the scream” and “vampire”, which showed his true emotion feelings. Edvard Munch had been through a lot of trauma, hurt and heartbreak in his life and his art work and painting helped him to expressive his feelings. I am going to be analysing and studing the Painting “The Scream”.

             Edvard Munch was an Impressionist painter. Expressionism is movement in the arts during the early part of the 20th century that emphasized subjective expression of the artist's inner experiences. This may be why Edvard Munch had such a talent for this type of art as he had been through so much in his life, and wanted to express his emotion. Expressionism is not an art that is based on reality of something but more on the emotion of the thing. E.g. there is a painting of a man sitting on a chair. But in Expressionist painting the colours, emotion and shapes would show the mans emotions to show a completely different picture and story. This is why Expressionist art is so unique and distinctive as it can tell a whole different story, and show so may different deep emotions and feelings in one painting. Expressionism is one of the most popular types of art in the later 19th and the 20th centuries. It shows an individual, impulsive, self-expressionate piece of art.

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    Edvard Munch used a range of expressive colours like Reds, dark blues, and oranges. The sky is filled with fiery reds and oranges. This could represent the anger, frustration in the artist life. The ocean is filled with cold blues and greens. This could symbolise depression despair and misery in Edvard Munch’s life.  There is also a whirlpool in the middle of the ocean. Where there looks like there are a few boats are getting pulled in. I think this represents that Edvard Munch is stuck in the middle of emotions, fury and anger or depression and misery ...

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