Edvard Munch
Edvard Munch was born on this day in 1863. What else can we say than just present his painting Death and Life, owned by Munch Museum?
Death and Life from 1894 depicts a human skeleton and a shapely naked woman in a passionate embrace. The image illustrates the intimate connection between love and death, Eros and Thanatos.
On the right edge of the composition are two large, thin, embryo figures; on the left is a billowing stream of semen, as if seen through a microscope.
Munch introduced sperm in this painting; and in doing so added a modern, scientific dimension to this traditional dance of death motif.
The two figures on the right are strange creatures, thin and amorphous, which can easily lead one to think of corpses—or to the main figure in Scream, which also looks like both an embryo and a ghost.
Such themes, where life and death are seen as inseparably connected, were of great concern to Munch in the 1890s, and can be recognized in many of his pictures from this period. The motif with its embryos and sperm, symbols of the beginning of life, are also found in an etching from 1894 and in a lithograph of Madonna from 1895.
The painting Death and Life is in a fragile condition and we can see that the surface is damaged. The damage has occurred as a result of the way in which Munch treated the paintings; he experimented and took advantage of the opportunities and effects that cropped up during the creative process.
We present today's painting thanks to Munch Museum <3
We encourage you to read our article "Edvard Munch and Death", where you will see more artworks like this!