| Artist: | Munch, Edvard |
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|---|---|---|
| Title of Work: | The Death Chamber | |
| Date of Work: | 1893 | |
| Nationality: | Norwegian | |
| Context: | The Turn of the Century | |
| Movement: | Symbolism/Proto-Expressionism | |
| Medium: | Oil | |
| Proto Expressionism "pictures from the reverse side of the eye" Subject: death, expressed through the grieving family. We do not see the face of the dying girl who is seated in the chair; instead we look into the faces of those who will survive her. Even though it is a group image, it is a picture of alienation as each individual must deal with death on his or her own terms. The image is very silent, with death expressed as an emotional void--the presence of an absence. Motifs from the life of a modern soul, act IV: death. Style: highly subjective point of view, emotionally charged. The scene as felt more than seen with the outward eye. Space is worked expressively to indicate an absence and emotional void. The figures stare outward, but seem to be looking inward. Context: turn of the century anxiety; expressionist path to the interior. Munch: "We should stop painting interiors with people reading and women knitting. We should paint living people who breathe and suffer and love." No longer an example of "furnished portraiture," where the character of the figure is displaced to the furnishings and decor. Munch here shifts away from the social to the psychological. Age of Freud and the discovery of the unconscious. | ||
