Photo via Pexels. The MUNCH museum on the Oslo waterfront in Bjørvika, a general view rather than a specific artwork.
A figure on a bridge clamps their hands to their face, the sky behind them burns orange and red, and the whole landscape seems to ripple with sound. Almost everyone has seen it, on mugs, in emoji and in parodies. Far fewer people know that the painter, Edvard Munch, was a Norwegian who spent his life working through grief, illness and anxiety on canvas, and that the best place to meet him is Oslo.
This is a guide to Munch the man, the story of The Scream, and how to see his work if you travel to Norway.
A Childhood Shadowed by Loss
Edvard Munch was born on 12 December 1863 in Løten, in eastern Norway, and grew up in what was then called Christiania, now Oslo. His father, Christian, was a military doctor with a strict religious streak. His mother, Laura Cathrine, died of tuberculosis when Edvard was five. His older sister Sophie died of the same disease at fifteen.
Illness and death are not background themes in Munch’s art. They are the subject. Paintings such as The Sick Child return again and again to a sickbed, and Munch later said that illness, insanity and death were the black angels that stood over his cradle.
Finding His Own Style
Munch trained in Christiania and spent long periods in Paris and Berlin, soaking up Impressionism and the Symbolists. He soon pushed away from painting what the eye sees and toward painting what the mind feels. In 1892, an exhibition of his work in Berlin caused such a scandal that it closed after about a week, an episode that helped make him famous across Germany.
His big project in these years was what he called the Frieze of Life, a cycle of paintings about love, anxiety and death. The Scream, Madonna, Vampire and The Dance of Life all belong to it. Together they feel less like a gallery wall and more like a single long, uneasy poem.
The Story of The Scream
Munch described the origin of the picture as a walk at sunset, when the sky turned blood-red and he felt “an infinite scream passing through nature”. Many scholars place the scene on the hill at Ekeberg overlooking Oslo’s fjord, and a viewpoint there now draws visitors who want to stand where the image may have begun.
Two things surprise people about the painting:
- The figure is not screaming. They are covering their ears against the scream of nature around them. The two figures on the path behind are calm and unbothered.
- There is more than one Scream. Munch made several versions between 1893 and 1910, in tempera, crayon, pastel and as lithographs. The 1893 painting hangs in the National Museum in Oslo, while the 1910 version belongs to the Munch collection.
The Thefts
The Scream has also become one of art history’s most stolen images. On 12 February 1994, the day the Lillehammer Winter Olympics opened, thieves climbed through a window of the National Gallery in Oslo and took the 1893 version, leaving a note that thanked staff for the poor security. It was recovered a few months later.
A decade later, on 22 August 2004, armed robbers took the 1910 version and Madonna from the Munch Museum in broad daylight. Both works were recovered in 2006 with some damage and were carefully restored. A different 1895 pastel version, held privately, sold at auction in New York in 2012 for almost 120 million dollars, then a record for a work of art at auction.
Later Life and Legacy
Munch had a breakdown in 1908 and spent months in a Copenhagen clinic. He returned to Norway, and his later work became brighter and more outdoors-focused, with sunlit landscapes and murals. He bought the Ekely estate in Oslo in 1916 and lived and worked there, largely alone, for the rest of his life. He survived the Spanish flu and painted himself recovering from it.
When the Nazis occupied Norway, Munch’s art was officially disapproved of, and works had already been removed from German museums in 1937 under the “degenerate art” campaign. He died at Ekely on 23 January 1944, aged 80, and left the works in his possession to the city of Oslo: roughly 1,000 paintings and thousands of drawings and prints. That bequest is why the city is the world’s centre for Munch.
Where to See Munch in Norway
The MUNCH museum, Oslo
Opened in 2021 in the Bjørvika district, MUNCH is a tall, modern museum beside the Opera House. It holds the world’s largest collection of his work, so only a small part is on display at a time. Versions of The Scream are rotated because the cardboard and paper they are made on are fragile. Check the museum’s website for opening hours, ticket prices and current exhibitions before you go.
The National Museum, Oslo
The National Museum, which opened in its new building in 2022, holds the 1893 painted The Scream together with other Norwegian masterpieces. Exact displays change, so check which Munch works are out before visiting.
Ekeberg and Åsgårdstrand
Outside the museums, walk the Ekeberg hillside for the view that may have inspired the painting, and consider a day trip to Åsgårdstrand, the small coastal town where Munch spent many summers and painted some of his best-loved scenes.
Planning Your Visit
- Combine Munch with the rest of the city using our complete Oslo city guide and our guide to the best museums in Oslo.
- Refuel between galleries at one of the best coffee shops in Oslo.
- Fit it into a longer trip with our 7-day Norway itinerary, or browse famous landmarks in Norway.
- If museums are your thing, our guide to Scandinavian design museums covers the best Nordic collections.
- Another Nordic storyteller worth meeting: Hans Christian Andersen.
Why Munch Still Matters
Munch’s genius was to treat inner states as seriously as landscapes. Anxiety, jealousy, longing and grief became colour, line and space. A century and a half on, that is exactly why The Scream keeps resonating: it paints a feeling almost everyone has had. Stand in front of it in Oslo, and you may find that it feels less like an old painting and more like a mirror.
