How Did Edvard Munch Attempt to Visualize Intense Emotion in his Paintings?

Artists in the early 1900s commonly utilized techniques of distortion and exaggeration, characteristics of expressionism, to establish the element of emotion. According to Wolf (2017), expressionist artists often incorporate “swirling, swaying, and exaggeratedly executed brushstrokes to convey the turgid emotional state of the artist reacting to the anxieties of the modern world” (p. 1). Amplification of the human figure often evokes strong emotions for audiences of many different cultures. Additionally, the style reflects the consequences of urbanization, such as the alienation of individuals in society (Wolf, 2017). Expressionism allows artists to surpass realism and reflect the tribulations of living in a modern society.

German Expressionism is a kind of art that is supposed to make you feel something. When you look at a painting such as “The Scream” by Edvard Munch (1863-1944), you ask yourself what kind of emotions does this painting give you. A group of early 20th century German artists used the term “expressionism” to desribe the way they produced art. The title later turned into “German Expressionism”. This art movement was prominent during 1905-1925. In German it is known as “Die Brucke” and “Der Blaue Reiter”. Unlike Impressionism, its goals were not to reproduce the impression by the surrounding world, but to express the artists feelings on the surrounding world. Expressionism comes from the route word “expression” which

Edvard Munch's "The Scream" was painted around the end of the 19th century, and is possibly the first Expressionist painting. The Scream was very different from the art of its time. During this time artists tried to paint realistic paintings. Munch was a tortured soul, and it certainly showed in this painting. Most of his family had died, and he was often plagued by sickness. The Scream was a reflection of what was going on at the time, and what was going on in Munch's own mind

“Vincent van Gogh and Paul Gauguin drew their inspiration from emotions. Van Gogh declared that "instead of trying to reproduce what I have before my eyes I use color more arbitrarily in order to express myself forcibly," whereas Gauguin advised a fellow painter: "Go on working, freely and furiously, you will make progress.... A strong emotion can be translated immediately” (Maurice Malingue qtd. in Galenson and Weinberg_2).

Art represents the divine through delivering what could be captured in our eyes, and the nature is the best media for human’s spiritual transcendence. During the period between 1880 and 1930, because of the rapid urban development in Europe and North America, the nature had become the path for artists to explore spiritual mediation. Natural landscape was widely used by artists as a metaphor for life of spirits, while the urban landscapes is regarded as the death of spirits. From the ongoing exhibition “Mystic Landscapes: Masterpieces from Monet, Van Gogh and more” in the Art Gallery of Ontario, it is interesting to find that the two masterpieces by Vincent van Gogh and Edvard Munch are sharing some similarities even though they were working on the different subject matters. In terms of chronologies of art history, there is commonplace to consider the subtle relations between the works of Van Gogh and Munch. These two artists who had gained outstanding achievement on their artistic career, both went to Paris for further professional training yet never met each other. Since the 1900s, Van Gogh’s and Munch’s works were exposed to the public on various art exhibitions, and were often displayed side by side since they are both experts using brushstrokes to create modern visual effects. Though Munch and Van Gogh’s painting are differing from each other on their practice of using paint (color), brushwork and lines, they were focusing on studying nature to observe inner human

I instantly fell in love with it, and simultaneously became fascinated by this artist who could so fully capture a feeling of utter terror, with The Scream, and a deep feeling of the difficulties surrounding love, with this painting.

The purpose of this essay is to fully employ all of the new observational skills that I have learned from the start of the semester to now. With that in mind, I was feeling very excited to use these new “abilities” as I was observing art. The San Diego Museum of Art was very interesting indeed, and I have never experienced art in such a way that is sort of hard to describe. The museum had paintings and galleries ranging from the Renaissance era all the way to the eighteenth century and even Impressionism and Post-Impressionism as well. However, my eyes instantly caught Henri Matisse’s painting, Bouquet, this painting had so many details, elements, and meanings as well as similar characteristics from past chapters that I have read this semester.

Emotions in art have social implications, and they always have something in common with the original feelings experienced by every human being, so an artist never experiences merely a simple emotion, but rather a kind of a general social feeling.

Human emotions remain as one of the world’s biggest secrets. Like sleep, we know what happens to our body when we experience these emotions whether it be a release of hormones or a certain area on the body becomes more sensitive. But we don’t know why we have them, experience them, or what purpose they serve. All we know is everyone’s emotions behave differently. Different types of arts can elicit completely different emotional response from people. Some art may have the ability to appeal to dangerous emotions in certain people. Whether it be the corruption of a once faithful and beautiful young girl, plagued by the desire for romanticism and lofty ideas, or a handsome young nobleman who is obsessed with living life to fullest. Both are fueled by the emotion that a certain type of art elicits in them, leaving them in a never ending chase that ruins there life’s. In the Novels Madame Bovary and The Picture of Dorian Grey the protagonists in these stories perfectly exemplifies the danger of arts emotional appeal by showing the corruption and eventual downfall of two once young and beautiful souls by exposing them to art that pleases dangerous emotions such as desire, pleasure, entitlement and disappointment.

Around the turn of the century many artists were trying to lay the foundation for modern art. In the 1880’s and 1890’s Art Nouveau, an international style of decoration and architecture urbanized. New developments also included, Post Impressionism, which “rejected the objective naturalism of impressionism and used form and color in more personally expressive ways.” At the time Romanticism, a growing artistic movement, was popular to artists like Runge, Goya, Blake and Friedrick, all who inspired Munch during the various stages of his artistic life. However, when compared to other artists of the time, Munch was new and ingenious. Able too courageously and dispassionately “reveal his innermost secrets of his own life,

Dark colors picture anguish, loneliness and to a certain extent the feeling of insignificance of the man. On the other hand, bright colors denote what he thinks of his lover. Munch use lines to draw the viewer’s attention to the main area of interest. In this case, that is the connectedness of the man with his lover despite their separation. One example of a line is the woman’s golden hair floating towards him as a symbol of their love. Lines are also used to etch the man’s facial expressions and the woman’s lack thereof. But other than the two lovers, the nature in the background has a symbolic meaning. The crimson bush, the tree, the land, the sky and the water all help represent the man’s inner turmoil. All of the elements of the painting collectively help to convey the permanence of

     Munch had a series of paintings that were exhibited in a major art show in Berlin. The series was entitled The Frieze of Life, all six of these paintings caused such shock that the show was forced to shut down. Munch had so much feelings, passions, anguish, stress, sorrow, and pain in his paintings that people just didn't understand what was going on. He thought that people were just afraid of the truth. Munch had let his feelings out, not through rage or anger, but through art, some people that attended the show saw more than just art they saw one mans feelings. Munch's painting began having a big part in German Expressionism.

“The Scream” is a famous painting by Edvard Munch .The 1893 painting is regarded as one of the most iconic human figures in the history of Western art. The painting is described by Munich as an autobiographical representation of his own feelings of insanity. The painting was created by Much through the use of oil, tempera, and pastel while he was living in Oslo, the capital and perhaps the most popular city in Norway. The painting is generally described as abstract. It is referred to as being an iconic part of the Expressionism Movement, a movement that manifested in Germany from 1905 until 1950.The movement established a new way and approach to artistic presentation. America journalist Arthur Lubow cites the painting as “"an icon of modern art, a Mona Lisa for our time."(Lubow, 2006)

The Human Condition, or La condition humaine was two paintings created by Rene Magritte, one in 1933 and the other in 1935. Both contain many formal similarities, yet the main point of the painting is that there is a painting of a landscape, yet that painting perfectly fits with, or completes, the landscape, as if it was perfectly drawn. In this analysis, I will be analyzing Magritte’s first painting, made in 1933. Magritte’s works often include objects hiding behind others, such as with Magritte’s The Son of Man, where a man in a bowler hat is hiding his face behind a floating apple. Magritte does this also in the Human Condition, yet to express a different meaning. Magritte is one of the major spearheads of the surrealist movement, a type of modernism, in which the fabric of realism and definitions are questions. One of Magritte’s more famous works, The Treachery of Images, Magritte shows a picture of what obviously is a pipe, yet, written in French beneath the image, states “This is not a pipe.” This was the dawn of a philosophy which would take the western art world by storm, called structuralism/post-structuralism. This is the philosophy where ideas/words and their meanings can be flexible depending on the viewer or the circumstance. This philosophy believes in the subconscious identification with images/colors that people have with art. In Magritte’s Treachery of the Images, his statement that “this is not a pipe” can be interpreted in different ways. One could say,

Philip Guston’s Studio painting, covers many themes of human nature which he uses as an unusual nonrepresentational abstract form of symbolism to touch on the severe subjects. His brushwork in this piece not only borrows from the ideas of abstract art, but the formation of images and background also shows glimpses of figuration by showing cartoon-like objects to expose more of these severe subjects. The objects that portray the random images in the background give hidden meaning, such as the light bulb, the clock, and cigarettes which refer to the agony of death and human mortality. The accomplishment of this piece was him using many different styles together that shows off in a silly interesting fashion. I would describe his work with a blending