Description
"Edvard Munchs painting Despair is dominated by a strong emotional pitch. In the foreground is a well-dressed man with bowed head, facing a sombre, mountainous landscape. The red sky and the narrow bridge railing are familiar from the composition for Munch’s most famous painting, The Scream. Munch often made several versions of his most significant motifs. The painting Despair, which is in the Thiel collection, launched a whole series of angst paintings. While working on it, he wrote in his diary, 'I was walking down the road with two friends – the sun was setting. – I felt a waft of melancholia – Suddenly the sky turned red. I stopped, leant against the railing, tired to death [...] – I stood there trembling with anxiety – and I sensed a great, infinite scream through nature' The artist’s emotional turmoil arises in the altercation with the natural setting, and then colors his experience of the landscape, in a way that appears to dissolve the line between outer and inner life."
Text: Patrik Steorn
Bibliography
Thielska Galleriet. Utkast till katalog över måleri, skulptur, grafik / Draft for catalogue over painting, sculpture, prints, 1929
Brita Linde, Ernest Thiel och hans konstgalleri, Stockholm, Alb. Bonniers boktryckeri, 1969
Ulf Linde, Arne Eggum, Edvard Munch och Thielska Galleriet, Stockholm, Atlantis, 2007
Hans-Martin Frydenberg Flaatten, Edvard Munch : måneskinn i Åsgårdstrand, Oslo, Sem Stenersen, 2013
Otto Selén, Edvard Munch : Livets dans , Helsingfors, Didrichsens konstmuseum, 2014
Øystein Ustvedt, Trond Aslaksby, Peter Cripps, Edvard Munch : Det syke barn : historien om et mesterverk, The sick child : the story of a masterpiece, Oslo, Nasjonalmuseet for kunst, arkitektur og design, 2009
Annie Bardon, Arne Eggum, Timo Huusko, Gerd Woll, Munch og Warnemünde : 1907-1908, Oslo, Labyrinth Press, 1999
Rolf E. Stenersen, Hans-Martin Frydenberg Flaatten, Edvard Munch: Close-Up of a Genius, Oslo, Sem og Stenersen, 2013