The hidden message behind the painting.
Edward Munch painted 'The Scream' in 1895, and although many of his contemporaries described him as crazy, the truth is that he has gone down in history as one of the most relevant artists of the 19th and 20th centuries. And much more difficult we can still identify with his work in the XXI century . Surely many of us have recognized ourselves throughout this last year as that being that screams desperately in the middle of nowhere.
‘The scream’ reflects the anxiety and anguish of the human being , and that was the message that its author wanted to convey. Munch on his own picture of him.
He himself said that the painting was a reflection of a walk through his hometown, Oslo. He said so: “I walked one night on a road. I was tired and sick . I stared across the fjord, the sun was setting, the clouds were dyed red - like blood. I felt as if a scream went through nature - I thought I heard a scream. I painted this picture, I painted the clouds like royal blood . The colors were screaming."
His mental illness pushed him to create this work full of color and anguish , and although it soon became famous, it was not valued for what it is, a work of art. He decided to write behind her a hidden message that summed up what everyone thought: “Only a madman could have painted it” . This is confirmed by the latest research carried out by the Norwegian National Museum who ordered to analyze with infrared technology the writings found behind the work, believing that they could belong to Munch himself.
Thus, finally, comparing it with his notes and writings and with the first exhibition of the work in Oslo, the suspicions were confirmed. **The phrase belongs to the artist. **
"There is no doubt that the inscription is by Munch. The writing itself and the events that occurred when Munch first exhibited the painting in Norway support this conclusion. You have to get quite close to see the inscription. We rarely find such inscriptions in paintings, particularly not in one of the most famous in the world," says Mai Britt Guleng, a curator who has worked on the study of the painting during these months.
Pencil writing has always been visible but it was very difficult to interpret . "We chose to photograph it with an infrared camera to get a clearer image of the inscription. The charcoal in the pencil stands out more clearly and makes it easier to analyze the handwriting," said Thierry Ford, curator of paintings at the National Museum of Art. Norway.
The museum theory posits that the writing was done after hearing the Scharffenberg trial about his mental health, sometime in 1895 or later, that is, after the exhibition of the work in Kristiania.
"Munch was also concerned about the idea of a hereditary disease in the family. Both his father and his grandfather suffered from what was then known as melancholia and his sister Laura Munch had been admitted to Gaustad Psychiatric Hospital," explains Mai Britt Guleng.
And she adds: " The inscription can be read as an ironic comment , but at the same time as an expression of the artist's vulnerability. Writing on the finished painting shows that creating for Munch was an ongoing process."
A COMPREHENSIVE REPAIR
Since the work was stolen in 2004 (and found in 2006) has rarely been exposed to the public . The last time was in 2015 at the Van Gogh Museum in Amsterdam. The reason has been its deterioration due to humidity.
A thorough investigation by the Munch Museum and Italian scientists into its damage will allow the work to be put on public display again this year. Science has achieved that it can be restored as was done with some paintings by Van Gogh or Matisse, who also used similar pictorial techniques.