WEBVTT
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In the diaries,
which he is to write later in his life
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Edvard Munch often refers
to himself in the third person
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using the names "Brandt", "Nanssen"
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or "Karlemann".
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You can meet me after dinner.
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Consumption is widespread
in Kristiania nowadays
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especially amongst the poor
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and in crowded areas.
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How long are your working hours?
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From six to six
with an hour's break for lunch.
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- How much do you earn?
- Fifteen crowns a week.
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The year 1884.
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Kristiania, capital city of Norway
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with beerhalls, cafés,
several Tivoli music halls
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but with no opera, no ballet
and no academy of art.
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Bless us, O Lord
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and these Thy gifts
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which of Thy bounty
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we are about to receive. Amen.
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Of Kristiania's 135,000 inhabitants
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the ruling strata is
the middle-class, the borgerskap
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conservative by politics,
Protestant by religion.
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The Karl Johan Gate
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principle thoroughfare in a city
whose Germanic buildings
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reflect the origins
of its main architects.
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Here, in the summer,
weather permitting
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the Kristiania middle-class
gather for the daily promenade.
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I work in a factory too.
I have to be up before five
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to make breakfast
for my husband and children.
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The promenade upon the Karl Johan
begins around two in the afternoon.
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Music is played by a military band.
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The social system supported by
the Kristiania middle-class exists
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with a national budget
of 41.6 million Kroner
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under a criminal code,
which dates from the 1840s.
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It has no sickness benefit,
no old age insurance
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state-legalised prostitution organised
specifically for the middle-class
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and still no reform against
the labour of children in factories.
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The promenade upon the Karl Johan
lasts approximately for one hour.
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Upon its conclusion the men
retire home or to the beer-halls.
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The women retire home.
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Many of the poor children
in this city
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work in factories,
craft shops and domestic service.
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The working hours for these children
in this year 1884
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are as long as the maximum
allowed under Norwegian law
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for people on penal servitude
and hard labour
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and over 1/3rd of the industrial
labour force in this capital city
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is made up of boys and girls.
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- Do the children work?
- Yes, they're at the factory too.
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Eleven hours a day.
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- Help yourself.
- I'm too tired.
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The death of Laura Cathrine Bjølstad,
mother of Edvard Munch
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occurred in 1868,
following a pulmonary haemorrhage.
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Sophie has asked me
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to write down
my last will for her.
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I've called my testament
My Exhortations.
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"My dear children.
I am so afraid that in heaven
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"I shall miss you who are so dear
to my heart here on earth.
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"But, trusting in the Lord,
I shall beg for your souls
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"as long as He grants me life."
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In 1845, Edvard Munch's grandfather
became insane
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from a disease of the spinal cord.
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Father walked to and fro
across the floor.
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Then he sat down beside Mother
on the sofa.
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They whispered to each other
and leaned against each other.
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Karlemann looked at them
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and wondered why
tears ran down their cheeks.
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Mamma's full name
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was Laura Cathrine Munch.
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Mamma was very weak.
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She died a year after I was born.
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Isn't it nice to be
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together on an evening like this?
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"Death and the kingdom of death
were cast in the fiery sea.
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"This is another death. If not written
in The Book of Life..."
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The Munch family, following
the medical practice of the father
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have moved from one crowded house
to another
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in the poorer districts of Kristiania.
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How long have you had it?
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Three weeks.
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- Is your throat sore?
- Yes, a little.
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Open wide and I'll have a look.
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The first symptoms are fatigue
and poor appetite,
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an evening temperature
and a hint of a cold.
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When the disease develops,
one's temperature rises
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and the cold grows worse.
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One begins to sweat at night.
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Haemorrhage results
in more than 50% of the cases.
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Edvard Munch began painting in 1879.
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During the past four to five years
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he has created
about one dozen canvases,
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mostly views of the country
near his home
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and portraits of his family.
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What happens to those
who believe in God
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if they give way to masturbation?
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- The unfortunate wretches go mad.
- This applies to everyone.
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We all have a sexual instinct.
Everyone masturbates to some degree.
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- Women too?
- Women too.
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Peter Andreas Munch,
studying to be a doctor
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and Inger Munch,
younger sister of Edvard.
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What do you do out so late
every night, Edvard?
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You weren't home
until the small hours last night.
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So you've been spying on me?
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I hear when you come home.
I also know by the smell.
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At this time in Kristiania
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a small core of radical writers,
artists and students
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are gathering to protest
the existing order.
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Their spokesman, Hans Jæger,
writer and anarchist
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who urges his followers to overthrow
bourgeois society with its moral code
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and replace it with
a decentralised structure
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based entirely upon the
human capacity for love and feeling.
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All evil can be traced
to Christianity.
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Christianity suppresses
man's vital desires.
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What is a "respectable human being"?
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One who is not out at night
drinking with people like that.
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Be quiet, so that I may
speak with Edvard.
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Have you told your parents
you don't believe in God?
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I don't want to say I don't.
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Why not? Can't you follow
your free will?
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When Edvard Munch tells Jæger of
his repeated quarrels with his father
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Jæger tells him
to take a pistol, go home
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and shoot him dead.
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Are you out drinking?
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- Drinking? A glass of beer?
- You smell of spirits, too.
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That dreadful Jæger you mix with...
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he's the Antichrist incarnate.
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Jæger's group
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referred to by the Kristiania
middle-class as the Boheme
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and by Georg Brandes
as "that wild gypsy bunch"
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discuss late into the nights
nihilism, anarchy
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the works of
Charles Darwin and Karl Marx
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the role of Art,
the purpose of existence
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and free love.
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Nearly all the group are themselves
from the middle-class.
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Many, in protest, are women.
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If there's no evil
outside Christianity...
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Of course there's evil but
it comes from moral concepts.
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Today's society would
be happier if people
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were allowed to develop
their lusts and desires.
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- I understand you.
- Do you? You don't seem to.
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You never do what I want.
You follow your own course.
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You don't understand me!
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Much better than you think.
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No, you don't.
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We never seem to understand
each other in this house!
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In many of Munch's family studies
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the faces are turned to the side.
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Human contact with the eyes
is avoided.
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I'll never be done with you,
since you never do what I want.
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- I'm tired of this!
- Now you be quiet!
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The children missed school
a lot because of illness
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and I tried to study
with them at home.
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"Illness, insanity and death
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"were the black angels
that kept watch over my cradle
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"and accompanied me all my life."
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We can sit by the fire
until the water gets hot
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before you go to bed.
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My sister Sophie
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also died from tuberculosis.
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She was 15 years of age.
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"And I saw the dead
stand before the throne
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"and books were opened.
The Book of Life was opened
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"and the dead were judged
in accordance with their deeds
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"and the sea gave up its dead..."
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My sister Laura was very talented.
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She learned languages
and mathematics effortlessly.
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She got honours in Latin.
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But she was born with a difficult
and nervous disposition
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so she could never
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make use of her education.
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It's so dreary at home!
What did you do when you were young?
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That doesn't concern you.
At any rate I wasn't out and about.
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Munch is to say later of his father:
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"When anxiety did not possess him...
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"he would joke and play with us
like a child.
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"When he punished us, he could be
almost insane in his violence."
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You get no inspiration from
those people. And that woman...
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It would've turned out better
if I hadn't been scolded at home.
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Edvard, I want to talk to you.
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Your aunt said that a plate
was broken.
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Was it Peter Andreas?
00:15:34.999 --> 00:15:37.639
- No, it was Laura.
- No, it was Edvard.
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The Bible says that you're punished!
Onan was punished.
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It also says that man
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must replenish the earth.
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One doesn't do that
by masturbating!
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That was nice and warm, wasn't it?
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Now we'll wash our ears.
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Two brothers and three sisters
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watching each other
grow into puberty
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tended over by their aunt Karen
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who, remaining unmarried,
has devoted her life
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to raising the children
of her dead sister.
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Half of the adults
in this country are women.
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They are also citizens but
they are placed under guardianship
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and are tyrannised
by men and by society
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emotionally, legally and economically.
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I must make sure that
there aren't too many bills at once.
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In the workplaces where we're
admitted, industries and schools,
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we get one-third of the wages
men get for the same work.
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Using his reflection in a mirror
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4 years ago Edvard Munch painted
the first of his self-portraits.
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"These self-trials
from the difficult years."
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What sort of work do they do?
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They work at putting together
matchboxes.
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Their fingers are burned
by the phosphorus.
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Many of Norway's older painters
have now returned from Europe.
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Some have set up informal academies
00:18:07.319 --> 00:18:10.919
such as Christian Krohg, age 32
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whose own canvases,
showing a direct concern for life
00:18:14.919 --> 00:18:18.759
both in his own middle-class milieu
and in the poorer class
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have already pioneered "naturalism"
in Norwegian art.
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How much do they earn?
00:18:26.039 --> 00:18:27.718
One crown a day.
00:18:30.039 --> 00:18:32.319
How old are the children?
00:18:33.039 --> 00:18:36.799
The oldest is 14.
The youngest girl is 12.
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The most important thing in art
00:18:43.199 --> 00:18:45.799
is its own means, like colour.
00:18:45.879 --> 00:18:50.119
It doesn't matter what you paint.
You can paint horse dung.
00:18:50.199 --> 00:18:54.719
- Then you paint for yourself?
- The colour must be a joy to see.
00:18:56.679 --> 00:19:00.078
Fritz Thaulow,
leading Naturalist painter,
00:19:00.879 --> 00:19:04.959
whose work reflects
the opposing Norwegian school of art.
00:19:05.039 --> 00:19:08.879
Such painters as Thaulow, Gerhard Munthe
and Christian Skredsvig
00:19:09.639 --> 00:19:13.359
Hans Heyerdahl, Erik Werenskiold
and Harriet Backer
00:19:13.719 --> 00:19:17.479
tend to express a feeling for
the countryside and for people
00:19:18.359 --> 00:19:22.359
but often from a less political
and more personal viewpoint.
00:19:22.479 --> 00:19:26.039
Who wants to look at horse dung?
00:19:26.759 --> 00:19:30.398
The paint can be
an aesthetic pleasure for you.
00:19:32.279 --> 00:19:36.319
But the public need not regard it
as an aesthetic pleasure.
00:19:38.599 --> 00:19:41.079
He must concentrate on art!
00:19:41.159 --> 00:19:44.559
People must undergo
an experience looking at art.
00:19:46.599 --> 00:19:50.039
But which people?
The bourgeoisie.
00:19:50.399 --> 00:19:52.039
They can afford
00:19:52.399 --> 00:19:54.359
to buy works of art.
00:19:54.719 --> 00:19:58.759
But what about those
who queue for food?
00:20:03.718 --> 00:20:08.039
For Edvard Munch
the artistic problem lies deeper:
00:20:08.559 --> 00:20:14.838
somehow to express the tension
growing in himself and in his family.
00:20:21.838 --> 00:20:29.879
"To Norway, giants' native land
Let's drink this toast of honour"
00:20:30.478 --> 00:20:33.959
In answer to the
10 commandments of Christianity
00:20:34.359 --> 00:20:38.039
the Boheme, seen here
singing a patriotic song
00:20:38.599 --> 00:20:40.878
has published nine of its own.
00:20:41.639 --> 00:20:43.679
Amongst these, the requirements
00:20:43.799 --> 00:20:46.559
to never borrow less than 5 krone
00:20:46.638 --> 00:20:48.838
to never wear celluloid cuffs
00:20:49.359 --> 00:20:52.678
to never fail to make a scandal
in the Kristiania theatre
00:20:52.759 --> 00:20:54.519
to never regret
00:20:54.598 --> 00:20:56.919
to sever all family bonds
00:20:57.439 --> 00:20:59.479
and to take one's own life.
00:21:01.799 --> 00:21:03.798
There has been a lot of illness
00:21:03.918 --> 00:21:05.079
and death in our family.
00:21:07.119 --> 00:21:10.879
Mamma died of tuberculosis
when she was 30 years old
00:21:12.998 --> 00:21:17.879
and Granny died of the same disease
when she was 36.
00:21:20.359 --> 00:21:25.919
I have a dream of founding
a school for young women
00:21:26.039 --> 00:21:28.439
who are morally confined.
00:21:29.399 --> 00:21:31.719
Just look at the bourgeoisie
00:21:31.799 --> 00:21:35.839
and all the middle-class girls
that suffer from anaemia.
00:21:38.119 --> 00:21:42.959
It's a good cause. I mean...
founding a school for them
00:21:43.718 --> 00:21:48.839
and teaching them to develop
their feeling for love.
00:21:49.239 --> 00:21:52.078
They can become capable of feeling.
00:21:58.039 --> 00:22:02.478
The Christian names of the woman
sitting to the right of Edvard Munch
00:22:02.559 --> 00:22:05.679
are Andrea Fredrikke Emilie.
00:22:05.759 --> 00:22:07.959
She is nicknamed "Millie".
00:22:08.039 --> 00:22:10.598
Her age is 24.
00:22:11.118 --> 00:22:14.919
For 3 years she has been married
to a Kristiania city doctor
00:22:14.998 --> 00:22:17.799
who is 9 years her senior in age.
00:22:18.678 --> 00:22:20.799
She has no children.
00:22:36.798 --> 00:22:39.278
All the virtuous little misses
00:22:39.359 --> 00:22:42.999
will trip down the Karl Johan.
00:22:46.439 --> 00:22:48.878
Jæger's vision is to set up
a special school
00:22:48.959 --> 00:22:52.999
for the "prim young misses"
of middle-class Kristiania
00:22:53.079 --> 00:22:55.359
educate them into proud women
00:22:55.438 --> 00:22:58.038
who might walk freely
down the Karl Johan
00:22:58.119 --> 00:23:02.558
with all the world knowing
that they love and have lovers.
00:23:02.639 --> 00:23:05.759
They would write
Boheme literature, open and frank
00:23:05.838 --> 00:23:08.718
about their personal experiences.
00:23:12.598 --> 00:23:16.759
Despite the somewhat bleaker reality
of the Karl Johan,
00:23:16.838 --> 00:23:20.958
Hans Jæger is also planning to write
a highly personal account
00:23:21.039 --> 00:23:22.799
of his own love life
00:23:22.878 --> 00:23:27.039
with a frankness hitherto unknown
in Norwegian literature.
00:23:27.359 --> 00:23:31.078
He urges Edvard Munch
to express himself in his work
00:23:31.559 --> 00:23:33.838
with the same total frankness.
00:23:34.719 --> 00:23:39.959
His father walked back and forth.
He kept his hands clasped.
00:23:47.519 --> 00:23:51.359
Hans Jæger is himself
currently and publicly
00:23:51.439 --> 00:23:54.239
having an affair
with a married woman
00:23:54.319 --> 00:23:57.598
Oda Lassen, age 24
00:23:58.599 --> 00:24:02.518
a painter, whose husband
is a wood and ice-merchant
00:24:02.599 --> 00:24:04.599
8 years her senior.
00:24:15.439 --> 00:24:17.679
I consider marriage
00:24:17.799 --> 00:24:22.918
to be based on something which
is completely impossible for me.
00:24:24.158 --> 00:24:31.038
One is obliged to love
another human being all one's life.
00:24:31.998 --> 00:24:36.199
It seems utterly absurd.
No one can order me
00:24:36.278 --> 00:24:40.319
to love someone
I have grown to hate.
00:24:59.239 --> 00:25:03.199
What do you think of
the Bohemians' conduct?
00:25:04.599 --> 00:25:09.038
One might characterise
their conduct as follows:
00:25:10.199 --> 00:25:14.439
I consider it to be
extremely unprepossessing
00:25:14.518 --> 00:25:23.479
and a distinct danger for
certain easily influenced souls.
00:25:25.998 --> 00:25:30.838
I'm not talking about prostitutes
but human beings who can love.
00:25:33.998 --> 00:25:39.239
The only thing they seem capable of
is so-called free love.
00:25:39.998 --> 00:25:43.239
But rabbits are capable of that too.
00:25:43.359 --> 00:25:49.478
"I love you, love you.
Take me, kiss me, hold me and then
00:25:50.038 --> 00:25:54.879
"embrace me, hug me
so that I never breathe again.
00:25:55.199 --> 00:25:57.958
"Your kiss is so fiery tonight.
00:25:58.079 --> 00:26:00.478
"Fever takes you in command.
00:26:00.558 --> 00:26:05.358
"Your tears run slowly down
and burn into my hand."
00:26:05.439 --> 00:26:09.279
Sigurd Bødtker,
student and poet.
00:26:09.358 --> 00:26:12.838
"Do you think that
I've tired of you?
00:26:12.958 --> 00:26:16.999
"Oh no! Smile happily
as you did before.
00:26:17.399 --> 00:26:19.719
"Stay with me tonight.
00:26:19.798 --> 00:26:23.638
"Let my arm
curl close about your waist."
00:26:28.519 --> 00:26:30.559
How were sexual matters
00:26:30.679 --> 00:26:32.678
dealt with in your home?
00:26:32.759 --> 00:26:35.958
They weren't dealt with at all.
00:26:36.078 --> 00:26:39.199
Everything was kept secret
around me.
00:26:39.798 --> 00:26:44.358
I understood nothing
until it was too late.
00:26:59.359 --> 00:27:03.838
Hans Jæger has told Munch
that the human function of sex
00:27:04.638 --> 00:27:08.758
is the most important
single process known to man.
00:27:08.839 --> 00:27:13.598
It is a source of pleasure,
a wave of sweetness and warmth
00:27:13.678 --> 00:27:17.558
through which man is elevated
and made less lonely.
00:27:18.039 --> 00:27:24.039
In her testament, Mamma asked
us to be good
00:27:25.839 --> 00:27:28.198
and to love Jesus.
00:27:29.198 --> 00:27:32.038
I try to obey my lusts.
00:27:32.399 --> 00:27:35.798
We have only one life and
00:27:35.918 --> 00:27:40.598
we must develop our ability
to feel and to love.
00:27:41.079 --> 00:27:46.598
The final passage of Jæger's book
details the burial of its hero:
00:27:47.919 --> 00:27:52.918
"Then, they have all vanished
and Jarman lies alone again
00:27:53.438 --> 00:27:59.398
"there in the desolate cemetery and
rots under his cover of flowers."
00:27:59.478 --> 00:28:03.598
Sophie, shall we sing
a Christmas carol?
00:28:19.479 --> 00:28:22.238
"And suddenly something opened
00:28:22.318 --> 00:28:26.478
"and we could see far,
far into heaven
00:28:26.558 --> 00:28:30.758
"and saw angels float,
quietly smiling."
00:28:45.558 --> 00:28:52.598
Four of Granny's eight children
died before they were 16.
00:28:57.958 --> 00:29:01.839
The Kristiania Bohemians say,
"Thou shalt
00:29:01.958 --> 00:29:04.878
take thine own life."
What are your views on that?
00:29:08.358 --> 00:29:10.398
I think it is wrong.
00:29:11.078 --> 00:29:16.638
We don't have a right to throw away
the lives God has given us.
00:29:17.398 --> 00:29:22.598
They should be used for Him
and our lives do have a meaning.
00:29:31.838 --> 00:29:34.118
Tell us about his work.
00:29:36.598 --> 00:29:39.959
Edvard Munch is a talented
young painter.
00:29:40.038 --> 00:29:43.278
But he's more interested
00:29:43.399 --> 00:29:47.438
in painting light and shadow
than social conditions.
00:29:49.439 --> 00:29:54.718
In 1884 Edvard Munch paints
this study of a servant girl
00:29:54.798 --> 00:29:59.558
partly dressed, seated on the edge
of a rumpled bed.
00:30:00.438 --> 00:30:04.318
The sunlight dissolves
the colours and contours.
00:30:04.918 --> 00:30:07.679
There is a sense of softness
00:30:07.758 --> 00:30:09.838
what Munch is to call later
00:30:09.918 --> 00:30:14.358
his "nervous dissolving
treatment of colour."
00:30:56.919 --> 00:30:59.358
What sort of a person is he?
00:31:01.638 --> 00:31:06.478
Very reticent, almost
aristocratically so
00:31:07.798 --> 00:31:12.198
which creates a distance
to the other members of the group.
00:31:13.958 --> 00:31:16.119
Amongst the colleagues
of Edvard Munch
00:31:16.838 --> 00:31:18.678
are Carl Nordberg
00:31:19.918 --> 00:31:22.038
Andreas Singdahlsen
00:31:22.718 --> 00:31:24.518
Halfdan Strain
00:31:24.598 --> 00:31:26.438
and Thorvald Torgersen.
00:31:27.838 --> 00:31:30.038
And Jørgen Sørensen
00:31:30.438 --> 00:31:32.638
crippled since the age of seven
00:31:33.318 --> 00:31:35.999
who is to die in his early 30's.
00:31:38.879 --> 00:31:41.118
We must take part in
00:31:41.238 --> 00:31:44.078
what is happening around us
00:31:44.158 --> 00:31:49.838
and, what with poverty and need
and children who have to work,
00:31:49.918 --> 00:31:53.318
we must join forces with the people
00:31:53.438 --> 00:31:55.678
not with the bourgeoisie.
00:31:55.758 --> 00:31:59.598
Painters mustn't be led astray
by new ideas...
00:31:59.678 --> 00:32:00.678
My Lord!
00:32:00.758 --> 00:32:03.918
...but sacrifice themselves
for their painting.
00:32:03.998 --> 00:32:04.998
Painting?
00:32:06.798 --> 00:32:11.758
Yes, but his painting emerges
from his own person.
00:32:13.198 --> 00:32:15.678
He is the one who paints.
00:32:15.758 --> 00:32:19.798
So art must express
the subjective view
00:32:19.918 --> 00:32:22.678
of the artist on reality.
00:32:26.398 --> 00:32:32.038
In 1884, Edvard Munch begins work
on a canvas of his younger sister
00:32:32.638 --> 00:32:36.358
a portrait that illuminates
her face and her hands.
00:32:36.838 --> 00:32:40.038
The remainder of her body
is shrouded in darkness.
00:32:41.038 --> 00:32:43.998
There is no movement
save for the tension
00:32:44.318 --> 00:32:47.758
in the slight raising
of the left hand.
00:32:52.718 --> 00:32:55.798
Edvard, my brother,
00:32:55.918 --> 00:32:59.878
almost died too
from the same disease.
00:33:02.198 --> 00:33:04.438
Lord God, I beg you...
00:33:07.038 --> 00:33:09.798
The near-death of 13 year-old
Edvard Munch
00:33:09.878 --> 00:33:11.838
from a pulmonary haemorrhage
00:33:11.958 --> 00:33:16.558
took place on Christmas Day, 1875.
00:33:18.638 --> 00:33:20.958
Has all the suffering
00:33:21.038 --> 00:33:24.798
in your family affected your faith?
00:33:26.318 --> 00:33:31.158
I don't think it's for me
to interfere in God's will.
00:33:32.718 --> 00:33:37.158
He loves us and we must be grateful.
00:34:09.478 --> 00:34:12.718
"Our Father who art in heaven
00:34:13.518 --> 00:34:17.558
"Hallowed be Thy name
Thy kingdom come
00:34:18.838 --> 00:34:22.958
"Thy will be done on earth
As it is in heaven."
00:34:23.038 --> 00:34:26.318
"A strange man,
dressed all in black
00:34:26.638 --> 00:34:28.998
"stood at the foot of the bed
and prayed.
00:34:29.998 --> 00:34:31.557
"The air was heavy and black."
00:34:33.078 --> 00:34:36.158
Munch's family is puritan.
00:34:36.238 --> 00:34:39.678
Everyone who's seen
his father knows that.
00:34:41.238 --> 00:34:42.878
When he's with us
00:34:42.998 --> 00:34:46.878
he has to go home
for family evening prayer!
00:35:02.598 --> 00:35:07.838
"Lead us not into temptation
But deliver us from evil
00:35:08.317 --> 00:35:13.038
"For Thine is the kingdom
The power and the glory
00:35:13.478 --> 00:35:14.918
"For ever.
00:35:15.838 --> 00:35:16.758
"Amen."
00:35:42.798 --> 00:35:47.117
- Have you met his family?
- I've not seen him pray either.
00:35:47.198 --> 00:35:49.078
He sits there like a monk!
00:36:19.238 --> 00:36:23.278
It was distressing
for the older children
00:36:24.437 --> 00:36:28.078
to see so much illness
and death.
00:36:32.758 --> 00:36:34.198
Are you sick?
00:36:39.318 --> 00:36:42.397
"If anyone worships
the beast's image
00:36:42.478 --> 00:36:45.957
"and receives a mark
on his forehead or hand
00:36:46.358 --> 00:36:49.478
"he shall drink
the wine of God's wrath
00:36:49.558 --> 00:36:52.758
"poured unmixed into
the cup of his anger
00:36:52.878 --> 00:36:57.798
"and he shall be tormented
in the presence of the holy angels."
00:37:00.438 --> 00:37:06.518
To be free on Sundays I have to work
17 to 18 hours the other days.
00:37:06.598 --> 00:37:07.998
It's hard work.
00:37:09.638 --> 00:37:11.918
Some of my friends,
after working hours,
00:37:11.998 --> 00:37:16.998
make so little that they often
take to the streets.
00:37:21.077 --> 00:37:23.478
The prostitutes of Kristiania
00:37:23.557 --> 00:37:26.398
many of them from the district
known as "Vika"
00:37:26.478 --> 00:37:29.037
are legalised
into a public institution
00:37:29.118 --> 00:37:32.838
under the control
of the police health authorities.
00:37:33.277 --> 00:37:37.117
Look at prostitution
in Kristiania today.
00:37:37.797 --> 00:37:43.557
According to Christian morals
there is no prostitution today.
00:37:43.638 --> 00:37:48.517
It's typical that prostitution
is controlled by the police.
00:37:49.877 --> 00:37:53.918
But you're for making people
live on prostitution.
00:37:53.997 --> 00:37:58.397
No. In my society there is
no room for prostitution.
00:37:59.877 --> 00:38:04.438
There are 300 police officers
in the city of Kristiania.
00:38:04.518 --> 00:38:09.357
Amongst their principal duties,
the control of venereal disease.
00:38:10.317 --> 00:38:14.758
It's the bourgeoisie
who gain from prostitution.
00:38:15.478 --> 00:38:19.517
Yet bourgeois morals
do not allow it to exist:
00:38:19.838 --> 00:38:22.758
"Thou shalt not commit adultery."
00:38:23.197 --> 00:38:26.237
What are your views on marriage?
00:38:27.997 --> 00:38:29.237
In my opinion
00:38:30.838 --> 00:38:36.198
marriage is an incalculably
important and necessary institution
00:38:37.398 --> 00:38:41.558
which undoubtedly
forms the foundation
00:38:41.638 --> 00:38:45.837
of our social and cultural structure.
00:38:46.797 --> 00:38:54.438
Without marriage, rootless
and chaotic conditions would arise
00:38:55.758 --> 00:38:57.958
which in turn, I fear,
00:38:58.798 --> 00:39:02.997
might easily lead to anarchy.
00:39:05.558 --> 00:39:10.158
In brief, if we want
to maintain peace and order,
00:39:10.517 --> 00:39:15.558
it is essential to support
and expand our institutions.
00:39:25.398 --> 00:39:29.638
The way society is today,
if one marries and has a wife,
00:39:29.717 --> 00:39:33.878
she is just as prostituted
as "the girls from Viken".
00:39:36.597 --> 00:39:41.517
Once every week each prostitute must
report to the police for inspection.
00:39:41.598 --> 00:39:42.838
Sit there.
00:39:47.758 --> 00:39:50.037
The year 1884.
00:39:50.878 --> 00:39:55.838
An American inventor called Maxim
develops the machine gun
00:39:56.438 --> 00:39:59.237
and the United States receives
Pearl Harbor
00:39:59.318 --> 00:40:01.318
as a Pacific naval base.
00:40:03.398 --> 00:40:08.038
Those who are prostituted
are excluded from society
00:40:08.797 --> 00:40:11.518
by the same people...
00:40:11.598 --> 00:40:13.077
Lean back.
00:40:13.158 --> 00:40:15.718
...who've put them
in that situation.
00:40:15.797 --> 00:40:18.397
That's the bourgeoisie's
love of humanity.
00:40:22.198 --> 00:40:26.237
A little wider.
Raise your feet higher.
00:40:37.197 --> 00:40:40.718
- Name and address.
- Line Pedersen.
00:40:40.838 --> 00:40:43.397
When I ask for your name,
I want your surname first.
00:40:43.478 --> 00:40:46.397
- Pedersen.
- Name...
00:40:48.118 --> 00:40:49.157
Pedersen.
00:40:49.277 --> 00:40:54.678
Because of my illness,
I'm grateful for the girls in Viken
00:40:54.757 --> 00:41:01.238
but I don't use them any more
than Mr Average uses his wife.
00:41:01.917 --> 00:41:04.757
To me marriage
is legal prostitution.
00:41:08.317 --> 00:41:10.078
You can go now.
00:41:10.158 --> 00:41:12.918
I assume the present assembly
00:41:13.038 --> 00:41:15.877
is well aware of who it is
00:41:15.997 --> 00:41:20.557
that uses prostitutes:
the bourgeoisie and the police.
00:41:54.317 --> 00:41:58.598
Once, when Grandfather came
home from a business trip,
00:41:58.677 --> 00:42:03.317
he found Granny behind
a screen together with
00:42:03.437 --> 00:42:05.237
three dead children.
00:42:09.438 --> 00:42:14.358
When Edvard Munch first shows
his completed painting, Inger in Black
00:42:15.117 --> 00:42:19.558
the conservative press
in Kristiania refer to...
00:42:19.637 --> 00:42:22.718
"his almost frighteningly
ugly portrait
00:42:22.797 --> 00:42:24.317
"of a lady in black"
00:42:25.717 --> 00:42:29.357
thus beginning a critical assault
on his work
00:42:29.878 --> 00:42:33.757
that is to last
for at least 15 years.
00:42:40.477 --> 00:42:43.957
In May 1885,
Edvard Munch visits Paris.
00:42:44.877 --> 00:42:46.878
For the first time in his life,
he comes
00:42:47.397 --> 00:42:51.037
face to face with
full-size classical art.
00:42:51.118 --> 00:42:53.397
He sees Velasquez
and Rembrandt
00:42:53.917 --> 00:42:55.118
and Manet.
00:43:13.517 --> 00:43:16.957
Three weeks later,
Munch returns to Norway
00:43:17.038 --> 00:43:20.638
and shortly afterwards
takes a boat with his family
00:43:20.717 --> 00:43:25.077
down the Kristiania fjord
to the little village of Bone.
00:43:45.838 --> 00:43:47.078
Hello.
00:43:48.277 --> 00:43:52.318
You live quite close to here?
Then we're neighbours.
00:43:53.077 --> 00:43:57.077
- Will you visit me one day?
- I'd like to.
00:43:57.157 --> 00:44:00.997
Some ladies are visiting today.
Perhaps tomorrow?
00:44:05.758 --> 00:44:10.597
In his diaries, Edvard Munch
refers to this woman
00:44:10.678 --> 00:44:12.998
as "Mrs Heiberg".
00:44:13.077 --> 00:44:15.677
It is not her real name.
00:44:15.758 --> 00:44:19.917
- Aren't you hungry?
- Yes, I am hungry.
00:44:27.997 --> 00:44:29.437
Beautiful landscape here.
00:44:39.237 --> 00:44:40.517
It's so blue.
00:44:48.557 --> 00:44:50.878
The year 1885.
00:44:51.398 --> 00:44:53.997
General Gordon dies at Khartoum
00:44:54.077 --> 00:44:56.758
Serbia invades Bulgaria
00:44:56.837 --> 00:44:59.557
the British annex Bechuanaland
00:44:59.638 --> 00:45:03.837
Karl Marx writes
volume two of Das Kapital
00:45:03.917 --> 00:45:09.997
and the future General Patton
and D. H. Lawrence are born.
00:45:13.557 --> 00:45:19.398
All the things he'd wanted to say!
He felt awkward and afraid.
00:45:21.637 --> 00:45:27.277
They walked on in silence.
His cheeks burned.
00:45:37.117 --> 00:45:41.837
Later in his life, Edvard Munch
is to express a deep disillusionment
00:45:42.397 --> 00:45:45.917
that all his father could do,
as a doctor
00:45:45.998 --> 00:45:49.957
for his dying mother and
his dying sister and for himself
00:45:51.437 --> 00:45:54.477
was to put his hands together
and pray.
00:46:09.197 --> 00:46:10.637
She spent time in bed
00:46:13.397 --> 00:46:15.437
coughing into a handkerchief.
00:46:16.438 --> 00:46:18.877
Did blood come this time too?
00:46:42.277 --> 00:46:45.597
- I kissed you. Are you angry?
- No.
00:46:49.157 --> 00:46:51.197
Kissed your neck...
00:46:52.957 --> 00:46:55.797
If you're angry, you can beat me.
00:46:58.278 --> 00:47:00.277
I'm not angry.
00:47:04.197 --> 00:47:07.437
Perhaps you'll let me
kiss your mouth?
00:47:20.918 --> 00:47:25.357
I'm in a fortunate position,
married with no children.
00:47:31.878 --> 00:47:36.717
One is free when one is married
and has no children.
00:47:38.517 --> 00:47:41.317
But what about your husband?
00:47:41.397 --> 00:47:44.397
He's nice. He lets me do
as I please.
00:47:48.637 --> 00:47:52.637
- Is he as nice as that?
- He's awfully nice.
00:47:53.997 --> 00:47:59.437
I probably hurt him
but I can't help it. I have to.
00:48:08.997 --> 00:48:12.237
Stand still like that.
Let me see you.
00:48:13.477 --> 00:48:16.237
How picturesque
you are in this light.
00:48:24.037 --> 00:48:27.957
I'm so restless at night.
I can't sleep.
00:48:28.557 --> 00:48:30.837
I have such dreadful dreams.
00:48:32.557 --> 00:48:36.557
I sleepwalk. I have such
a longing to come to you.
00:48:41.437 --> 00:48:45.877
I do so like the dark.
I can't stand the light.
00:48:47.477 --> 00:48:51.517
It should be like tonight.
So mysterious.
00:49:01.677 --> 00:49:06.917
I could do the most awful things
in the dark. Anything.
00:49:12.717 --> 00:49:14.637
Upon his return to Kristiania
00:49:15.357 --> 00:49:18.037
Edvard Munch pays
his first social call
00:49:18.437 --> 00:49:20.677
on the home of Mrs Heiberg.
00:49:24.917 --> 00:49:27.077
He looked at the worn steps.
00:49:27.837 --> 00:49:31.437
He remembered all
he had heard about her,
00:49:31.797 --> 00:49:37.477
all the lovers who had passed here
and quarrelled with her husband.
00:49:43.397 --> 00:49:45.677
He looked well, he thought.
00:49:48.957 --> 00:49:52.357
It was so heavy and dark
and subdued.
00:49:56.717 --> 00:50:01.357
He'd heard she usually lay
on the couch all morning.
00:50:02.717 --> 00:50:05.557
The light in here was favourable.
00:50:15.357 --> 00:50:20.197
Have you seen how the hair
grows out of his ears?
00:50:23.717 --> 00:50:25.557
Now he felt shy.
00:50:27.837 --> 00:50:30.197
He could find nothing to say.
00:50:32.557 --> 00:50:37.637
When they were near he felt
that she waited for him
00:50:37.717 --> 00:50:40.157
to throw his arms about her.
00:50:40.237 --> 00:50:45.197
We got these last spring.
They were rather expensive.
00:50:48.556 --> 00:50:51.717
But he thought it was...
he felt cold.
00:50:54.237 --> 00:50:56.277
It was the same shyness.
00:50:57.637 --> 00:51:00.517
He longed to be out
in the fresh air.
00:51:00.597 --> 00:51:04.357
This is where my husband works.
He's very orderly.
00:51:04.437 --> 00:51:07.357
Daddy, what I'm spitting up
is so dark.
00:51:07.437 --> 00:51:09.757
Everything has its place.
00:51:11.357 --> 00:51:13.597
I made that for him.
00:51:16.197 --> 00:51:18.917
- Shall we go out?
- No, I can't.
00:51:20.236 --> 00:51:22.197
Perhaps this evening?
00:51:24.477 --> 00:51:25.877
It's blood, Daddy.
00:51:26.437 --> 00:51:27.397
I don't want to!
00:51:27.916 --> 00:51:32.317
He stroked his head.
Don't be afraid, my son.
00:51:38.197 --> 00:51:39.477
I don't want to!
00:51:39.557 --> 00:51:42.477
What? Don't you want to?
Come here.
00:51:42.557 --> 00:51:44.397
Are you crazy?
00:51:45.357 --> 00:51:47.837
Don't be so frightened.
00:51:47.917 --> 00:51:52.037
What a wretched idiot you are.
00:51:52.637 --> 00:51:54.677
A cowardly wretch!
00:52:02.277 --> 00:52:07.117
Why are you so set on
becoming a great painter?
00:52:09.117 --> 00:52:13.757
You're going to die anyway.
Then you'll be gone.
00:52:18.477 --> 00:52:22.877
Using his aunt and a young girl
called Betsy as models
00:52:22.957 --> 00:52:25.077
Edvard Munch begins work
on a canvas measuring
00:52:25.557 --> 00:52:31.836
119.5 cm by 118.5 cm.
00:52:32.357 --> 00:52:34.917
The death of his sister Sophie.
00:52:34.996 --> 00:52:37.277
How quiet it is in the forest.
00:52:42.437 --> 00:52:47.037
Imagine living here, not alone
but with someone else.
00:52:48.797 --> 00:52:51.237
It's so mysterious here.
00:53:43.237 --> 00:53:45.837
Shouldn't he sit a little closer?
00:53:47.877 --> 00:53:52.717
But he remained where he was,
staring at Mrs Heiberg.
00:53:54.676 --> 00:53:56.716
At table Petra said,
00:53:57.717 --> 00:53:59.557
"I saw you talk to Mrs Heiberg.
00:54:00.397 --> 00:54:02.437
"Wasn't it Mrs Heiberg?"
00:54:03.596 --> 00:54:06.957
"Yes," he said carelessly
and reddened.
00:54:07.957 --> 00:54:13.077
"She looks dull," his father said.
"She behaves badly to her husband."
00:54:15.516 --> 00:54:17.557
People talk so much.
00:54:26.277 --> 00:54:28.357
What a ridiculous dream
00:54:28.477 --> 00:54:30.596
it has been all these years.
00:54:30.677 --> 00:54:35.517
A great painter...
It's better than being a doctor.
00:54:36.757 --> 00:54:40.277
But, compared to a king, it's nothing.
00:54:41.397 --> 00:54:44.996
And a king is no more
than a tiny microbe.
00:54:45.077 --> 00:54:48.996
Munch now begins to add
layer upon layer of texture
00:54:49.437 --> 00:54:52.797
with brush, palette knife
and even kitchen blade.
00:54:55.556 --> 00:54:58.837
I've started work on
a few canvases
00:54:59.197 --> 00:55:02.477
and there is one of them I think
00:55:02.597 --> 00:55:05.077
I can get something out of.
00:55:05.637 --> 00:55:07.317
I think it is going to be
00:55:07.437 --> 00:55:13.396
a good painting. I'm already
very pleased with it.
00:55:17.236 --> 00:55:20.077
I've been thinking of you.
00:55:23.717 --> 00:55:28.957
In the colours especially,
I can develop myself.
00:55:29.917 --> 00:55:35.876
It's something new.
As I said, I think it will be good.
00:55:39.196 --> 00:55:41.837
Is something troubling you?
00:55:42.157 --> 00:55:46.596
I do have a lot on my mind.
I have worries too.
00:55:47.717 --> 00:55:50.156
I have my work to think of.
00:56:00.917 --> 00:56:06.157
The beautiful pale face
with its soft full mouth,
00:56:07.036 --> 00:56:10.677
half closed eyes and throat.
00:56:13.117 --> 00:56:15.037
He had to own it again,
00:56:15.157 --> 00:56:19.076
to look into those eyes,
so often hard.
00:56:26.116 --> 00:56:29.356
Sophie and Edvard...
00:56:33.397 --> 00:56:36.236
I shall soon be leaving you
00:56:39.317 --> 00:56:44.677
and I'm so afraid of what
will happen to our family.
00:56:50.197 --> 00:56:52.956
That's why I want to talk to you
00:56:54.316 --> 00:56:57.157
and I hope you can promise me
00:56:57.597 --> 00:57:03.556
to take care of
Laura, Andreas and Inger
00:57:05.797 --> 00:57:09.197
so that I can go to heaven
with an easy mind.
00:57:10.037 --> 00:57:13.037
- Will you promise me, Sophie?
- Yes, Mamma.
00:57:15.837 --> 00:57:19.077
- Will you promise me, Edvard?
- Yes, Mamma.
00:57:55.916 --> 00:57:59.476
I feel you in here very strongly.
00:58:02.717 --> 00:58:06.356
- Have you had physical relationships?
- Many.
00:58:06.837 --> 00:58:10.957
Do you feel that you've fulfilled
yourself as a human being?
00:58:11.517 --> 00:58:16.356
I try. But there are
many obstacles.
00:58:17.316 --> 00:58:22.276
- Do you achieve satisfaction?
- Now but not before.
00:58:23.397 --> 00:58:26.956
When one is born one knows nothing.
00:58:27.476 --> 00:58:31.316
One is surrounded by adults
one looks up to,
00:58:31.397 --> 00:58:34.917
adults full of words and prejudices.
00:58:34.996 --> 00:58:40.876
Particularly in my family
which is very bourgeois.
00:58:41.237 --> 00:58:44.316
I was filled with lots
of admonitions.
00:58:44.397 --> 00:58:46.836
You mustn't do this. Do that.
00:58:49.796 --> 00:58:53.276
Things that I wanted to do
00:58:53.356 --> 00:58:56.637
were considered wrong
and conflicts arose.
00:59:02.677 --> 00:59:06.716
I've been thinking of you all night.
I haven't slept.
00:59:17.477 --> 00:59:19.357
A plate was broken today.
00:59:19.436 --> 00:59:20.836
Was it you?
00:59:20.956 --> 00:59:24.396
- No, it was Sophie.
- Sophie, did you do it?
00:59:24.796 --> 00:59:25.996
No. Edvard.
00:59:32.476 --> 00:59:35.516
- Sophie, was it you?
- No. Edvard.
00:59:37.716 --> 00:59:41.757
In Jæger's book
'From The Kristiania Boheme'
00:59:41.836 --> 00:59:45.236
he describes a scene
with a 16 year-old girl
00:59:45.317 --> 00:59:47.477
whom he has met on the street.
00:59:47.556 --> 00:59:50.036
"I went down on my knees
00:59:50.436 --> 00:59:54.637
"and stretched my hands
with my gaze resting on her eyes.
00:59:55.477 --> 00:59:59.596
"Her eyes retained
their shy expression.
00:59:59.676 --> 01:00:03.356
"Then at once they grew
large and tender.
01:00:03.476 --> 01:00:07.436
"And she drew me up to her,
put her arms about me
01:00:07.517 --> 01:00:11.357
"and rested her head
against my shoulders.
01:00:11.716 --> 01:00:15.877
"I leaned my head against hers
and kissed her black hair."
01:00:46.036 --> 01:00:48.476
Munch writes in his diary:
01:00:49.477 --> 01:00:52.436
"They were lying beside each other.
01:00:52.517 --> 01:00:54.796
"They didn't talk much.
01:00:55.117 --> 01:00:56.396
"'Poor you', she said
01:00:57.756 --> 01:01:02.476
"and stroked his wet hair
slowly... slowly."
01:01:03.836 --> 01:01:09.237
"She lay there with her head back
and her beautiful throat exposed.
01:01:09.316 --> 01:01:12.397
"I kissed it and wanted
to carry her to the bed.
01:01:12.476 --> 01:01:14.997
"But the touch of her soft limbs
01:01:15.116 --> 01:01:18.037
"took all strength from my arms."
01:01:21.037 --> 01:01:23.036
"She lay down on him.
01:01:23.956 --> 01:01:26.797
"The moment again when everything
ceased to exist.
01:01:28.356 --> 01:01:30.436
"Again and again."
01:01:34.116 --> 01:01:38.796
And that married woman -
you shouldn't be seen with her.
01:01:41.317 --> 01:01:45.756
Have you got something
besides your work to think of?
01:01:46.996 --> 01:01:51.396
I feel much calmer.
I sleep at night too.
01:01:53.277 --> 01:01:54.716
That's fine.
01:02:05.716 --> 01:02:08.156
You know that I need you.
01:02:21.476 --> 01:02:23.916
I'm so happy you came.
01:02:32.596 --> 01:02:34.837
What wonderful lips you have.
01:02:47.476 --> 01:02:51.876
Munch writes in his diaries
of making appointments to meet
01:02:51.957 --> 01:02:53.757
Mrs Heiberg on the Karl Johan
01:02:53.836 --> 01:02:59.036
only to have her pass him by with
her husband or a friend on her arm.
01:02:59.637 --> 01:03:03.757
Exactly who began to break
the appointments first is not known
01:03:03.836 --> 01:03:05.756
but Munch writes of retaliating
01:03:05.836 --> 01:03:09.756
by ignoring Mrs Heiberg
when they next meet.
01:03:09.836 --> 01:03:13.876
I waited for half an hour
on the Karl Johan.
01:03:16.076 --> 01:03:18.916
And when at last she came
01:03:19.036 --> 01:03:21.356
she simply walked past.
01:03:22.476 --> 01:03:24.916
She scarcely looked at me.
01:03:31.356 --> 01:03:35.317
It's a good thing
I don't like her any more.
01:03:35.396 --> 01:03:39.956
At about this same period,
Oda Lasson has told Hans Jæger
01:03:40.036 --> 01:03:44.756
that she is becoming emotionally
involved with Christian Krohg.
01:03:48.316 --> 01:03:52.356
When I try to live according to
what is right for me
01:03:52.716 --> 01:03:57.916
and try to find my freedom
and live according to my rules,
01:04:00.476 --> 01:04:04.436
the only thing the bourgeoisie
are interested in
01:04:04.517 --> 01:04:07.116
is how many love affairs I have.
01:04:08.836 --> 01:04:15.196
Only my friends look at
and talk about what I do...
01:04:16.196 --> 01:04:18.596
talk about my paintings.
01:04:22.116 --> 01:04:26.556
She talked about how
he had not greeted her on the street,
01:04:26.996 --> 01:04:30.236
how she was just as good
as other ladies.
01:04:30.756 --> 01:04:34.396
Look at Mrs Pettersen who
went with the lieutenant to Paris.
01:04:34.956 --> 01:04:38.956
It made him shudder to hear
of her affection.
01:04:47.037 --> 01:04:48.876
At first, Munch adds
01:04:48.957 --> 01:04:51.756
domestic details to the periphery
of the painting
01:04:51.837 --> 01:04:54.037
such as a chair, a glass, a bottle,
01:04:54.116 --> 01:04:56.836
a flowerpot on a window
and curtains.
01:04:57.636 --> 01:05:00.636
Then, slowly, over the months
01:05:01.116 --> 01:05:03.756
he begins to remove these details
01:05:03.836 --> 01:05:07.716
concentrating more and more
on the head of his sister.
01:05:08.396 --> 01:05:11.916
Munch's affair with Mrs Heiberg
is already deteriorating.
01:05:12.916 --> 01:05:18.756
He takes the hand of his sister and
paints it in broad and vague strokes
01:05:18.836 --> 01:05:22.676
blurring out its ability
for human contact.
01:05:23.236 --> 01:05:29.676
Her hand was large and coarse.
She placed her cheek against his.
01:05:30.036 --> 01:05:32.676
He turned his head away
01:05:32.796 --> 01:05:34.956
so their mouths didn't meet.
01:05:35.036 --> 01:05:36.836
She was too repulsive.
01:05:42.396 --> 01:05:44.636
I'm so glad you came.
01:05:45.956 --> 01:05:48.156
I saw you out with another man.
01:05:48.796 --> 01:05:50.036
Just a friend.
01:05:50.156 --> 01:05:51.476
Just a friend?
01:05:53.836 --> 01:05:58.916
I'd been waiting half an hour
and you walked straight past!
01:05:59.356 --> 01:06:02.116
I was with Lt. Lund.
01:06:03.276 --> 01:06:05.796
He's just a friend.
01:06:05.916 --> 01:06:07.516
Don't shout.
01:06:08.356 --> 01:06:10.396
Everybody can hear.
01:06:11.596 --> 01:06:17.636
Damn it, I have hundreds of things
to think of. This can't go on!
01:06:18.516 --> 01:06:22.036
I waited for more than half an hour!
01:06:22.116 --> 01:06:24.956
- Who was it?
- The banker.
01:06:29.996 --> 01:06:31.916
The year 1886.
01:06:32.476 --> 01:06:35.276
The French government
presents the United States
01:06:35.356 --> 01:06:37.396
with the Statue of Liberty
01:06:37.716 --> 01:06:42.836
and equips its own army with
the Lebel smokeless powder rifle.
01:07:15.396 --> 01:07:20.436
Perhaps if I tell her
that it's all my fault...
01:07:21.796 --> 01:07:24.836
Perhaps then she'll like me...
01:07:27.076 --> 01:07:29.996
If I tell her I could die for her...
01:07:30.596 --> 01:07:32.916
This is nothing to laugh at!
01:07:58.876 --> 01:08:01.236
Don't take it so much to heart.
01:08:03.636 --> 01:08:07.156
There are plenty of women
with her qualities.
01:08:07.836 --> 01:08:12.436
I find it difficult to know
what life I should lead.
01:08:12.996 --> 01:08:18.436
Even if I try to live freely
with men, they don't change.
01:08:18.996 --> 01:08:22.635
They consider that
a woman should behave
01:08:23.156 --> 01:08:27.756
in such-and-such a way,
which I can't do.
01:08:43.355 --> 01:08:44.956
It's long past midnight
01:08:47.195 --> 01:08:50.075
and you're out every evening.
01:08:51.316 --> 01:08:52.916
Will you answer?
01:08:52.996 --> 01:08:55.076
- Don't push me!
- Are you drunk?
01:08:55.716 --> 01:08:57.956
What do you do when you're out?
01:08:58.476 --> 01:09:00.756
He's just a friend.
01:09:01.995 --> 01:09:03.876
This can't go on!
01:09:07.156 --> 01:09:11.276
I feel that if ever
I am to find myself
01:09:11.356 --> 01:09:14.916
I can't adapt myself
to their standards.
01:09:16.436 --> 01:09:21.796
Men I am with,
who say that they are free,
01:09:21.916 --> 01:09:27.036
have beliefs too,
which obstruct my freedom.
01:09:27.876 --> 01:09:33.356
In fact I don't even know
what my freedom is.
01:09:33.436 --> 01:09:38.436
I can't take any more of this.
You know that!
01:09:42.315 --> 01:09:47.436
We mustn't speak to each other
like this. We mustn't.
01:09:47.916 --> 01:09:52.596
You're a human being
in a society oppressed
01:09:52.676 --> 01:09:57.436
by standards and prejudices
in every direction.
01:09:57.796 --> 01:10:02.036
Painters can't take notice
of political programmes.
01:10:02.396 --> 01:10:06.875
You have to paint something
as you see it.
01:10:07.316 --> 01:10:12.956
You can't sit down
and paint details.
01:10:13.315 --> 01:10:18.316
If you come from a bedroom
into the living room in the morning
01:10:18.395 --> 01:10:22.556
and see everything
as if in a bluish light,
01:10:22.635 --> 01:10:25.276
even the darkest shadows,
01:10:25.836 --> 01:10:29.915
that's how you should paint it.
As you see it.
01:10:32.276 --> 01:10:38.796
Colour means a great deal.
Colour is the mainstay of painting.
01:10:39.395 --> 01:10:40.796
Mood as well.
01:11:15.195 --> 01:11:19.715
She let herself be drawn closer.
Right up against him.
01:11:21.475 --> 01:11:26.476
He held her gently about the waist.
She reached up towards him.
01:11:28.875 --> 01:11:34.436
He felt a warm mouth against
his throat, a wet mouth against his
01:11:35.316 --> 01:11:37.756
and his mouth slipped in
towards hers.
01:11:46.516 --> 01:11:50.876
"A feeling of sweet impotence
poured over my shoulders
01:11:51.235 --> 01:11:53.875
"and flowed through my limbs.
01:11:54.876 --> 01:11:58.436
"I knelt and pressed her
tight against me
01:11:58.556 --> 01:12:02.556
"and kissed her uncovered throat
like one possessed."
01:12:06.996 --> 01:12:09.956
Haagen Ludwig Berg, an actor
01:12:10.035 --> 01:12:12.876
and a Lieutenant
in the part-time army.
01:12:16.396 --> 01:12:20.836
Miss Drefsen, referred to by Munch
as "Miss Rocker"
01:12:21.636 --> 01:12:24.595
whom he recently met at a carnival.
01:12:25.675 --> 01:12:30.075
Something I don't understand
occurs again and again
01:12:30.755 --> 01:12:34.916
and that is that a relationship
starts strongly.
01:12:34.995 --> 01:12:37.595
And I know what passion is.
01:12:37.676 --> 01:12:42.115
I don't know what love is
but I know what passion is.
01:13:15.475 --> 01:13:18.956
The odd thing is that it
begins with the feeling
01:13:19.035 --> 01:13:20.835
that all is worthless
01:13:20.955 --> 01:13:23.435
without this one person.
01:13:35.316 --> 01:13:38.556
We should not have spoken of it.
01:13:53.396 --> 01:13:58.635
And gradually, without you noticing
what is happening,
01:13:59.915 --> 01:14:03.676
this person becomes
the one who holds you back.
01:14:06.875 --> 01:14:10.236
Seeking now to de-emphasise
all unimportant details
01:14:10.315 --> 01:14:12.355
by blurring their images
01:14:12.756 --> 01:14:15.915
struggling to eliminate
Mrs Heiberg from his mind
01:14:16.716 --> 01:14:20.556
striving somehow to impart the
quiver and intensity of his feelings
01:14:20.635 --> 01:14:23.635
onto the raw surface
of his canvas
01:14:23.716 --> 01:14:26.956
seeking to awaken
a similar mood in the viewer
01:14:27.035 --> 01:14:30.796
Munch works and reworks
the head of his sister
01:14:30.875 --> 01:14:33.956
detailing hair, eyes and mouth
01:14:34.035 --> 01:14:37.956
only to scrape the oil
from the canvas and begin again.
01:14:38.035 --> 01:14:41.956
Using his knife, the back
of his brush, the point of a pencil
01:14:42.395 --> 01:14:46.756
Munch scratches and scores
deep into the thick oil
01:14:46.835 --> 01:14:51.475
as he struggles to remember
and struggles to forget.
01:14:54.396 --> 01:14:58.755
She looked into my eyes
with her fair hair
01:14:59.675 --> 01:15:02.516
and her pale, delicate skin.
01:15:02.595 --> 01:15:07.115
We had a good time
when last we met, didn't we?
01:15:10.596 --> 01:15:15.516
- I like you.
- You're sweet.
01:15:16.476 --> 01:15:18.595
I've been thinking of you.
01:15:20.515 --> 01:15:22.155
The whole time.
01:15:24.596 --> 01:15:28.515
- I like you too.
- How beautiful you are.
01:15:31.515 --> 01:15:33.236
You're strange.
01:15:34.835 --> 01:15:39.516
But you're a fine person.
You're sweet.
01:15:43.315 --> 01:15:45.316
What do you think of women
01:15:45.436 --> 01:15:48.395
who have extra-marital
relationships?
01:15:49.795 --> 01:15:56.075
In my opinion a woman is
and ought to be a defenseless
01:15:57.396 --> 01:16:03.435
and beautiful little being,
both in body and soul,
01:16:03.516 --> 01:16:07.396
who needs the protection
and security
01:16:07.516 --> 01:16:08.916
of a man.
01:16:10.595 --> 01:16:13.716
If you think this is funny, it's...
01:16:18.636 --> 01:16:26.316
She smiled with her pale lips
and white teeth.
01:16:28.315 --> 01:16:33.436
We suit each other, don't we?
You're so strange, Munch.
01:16:36.756 --> 01:16:41.835
In December 1885 Hans Jæger's book,
From The Kristiania Boheme
01:16:41.915 --> 01:16:45.595
is confiscated within two hours
of its publication.
01:16:46.356 --> 01:16:49.675
Four months later Jæger
is found guilty of blasphemy
01:16:49.756 --> 01:16:53.316
and "violation of
modesty and morality".
01:16:53.395 --> 01:16:55.715
He is sentenced to 60 days in prison
01:16:55.796 --> 01:16:58.676
and the permanent banning
of his book.
01:16:59.835 --> 01:17:04.635
Aimar Sørensen, Minister of Justice
in the Liberal Government.
01:17:04.716 --> 01:17:10.196
I received a copy of the book
from the police in Kristiania
01:17:10.876 --> 01:17:13.435
with certain parts underlined.
01:17:14.915 --> 01:17:20.595
I telegraphed at once to ask
all the police commissioners
01:17:20.995 --> 01:17:24.115
to stop publication of the book.
01:17:25.115 --> 01:17:30.835
In this part the lead character
in the book
01:17:30.955 --> 01:17:34.316
addresses himself
to a very young girl,
01:17:34.395 --> 01:17:37.955
so young that she could be
his daughter.
01:17:38.596 --> 01:17:41.235
She is sitting on his knee.
01:17:41.795 --> 01:17:46.836
This will give you an idea
of what it's about.
01:17:47.835 --> 01:17:52.395
"Listen, I said to her
while I patted her on the cheek.
01:17:53.396 --> 01:17:56.475
"Let's have a sensible little chat.
01:17:57.875 --> 01:18:03.595
"Do you know what this is?
I had taken a condom from my pocket.
01:18:04.075 --> 01:18:07.236
"No, she said.
Well, I'll tell you..."
01:18:07.315 --> 01:18:10.956
The following year Hans Jæger
will be forced to flee from Norway
01:18:11.035 --> 01:18:13.556
after the Liberal government
imposes upon him
01:18:13.635 --> 01:18:17.595
a second sentence of
150 days in prison
01:18:17.676 --> 01:18:20.875
this time for sending
300 copies of his book
01:18:20.956 --> 01:18:23.515
out of the country to Sweden
01:18:23.595 --> 01:18:27.995
under a cover entitled
"Christmas Tales by Hans Jæger".
01:18:28.995 --> 01:18:32.235
"...and it doesn't pass
through because...
01:18:32.356 --> 01:18:37.875
"And I blew up the condom.
Not even air passes through."
01:18:40.795 --> 01:18:45.195
I could read more
but I think that suffices.
01:18:50.835 --> 01:18:55.315
Cell no. 1 of the Møllergaten
district prison in Kristiania.
01:18:55.956 --> 01:19:00.876
Does imprisonment
influence your work?
01:19:01.235 --> 01:19:04.275
No, it has no influence whatsoever.
01:19:04.875 --> 01:19:09.355
That good people,
who use literature for diversion,
01:19:09.435 --> 01:19:14.635
scream and cross themselves
means nothing. I knew they would.
01:20:20.115 --> 01:20:28.995
It provokes the bourgeoisie
who live their cosy, false life.
01:20:29.875 --> 01:20:32.995
It provokes them to see free women.
01:20:33.675 --> 01:20:38.835
Everything outside the fence
they have raised around themselves
01:20:39.915 --> 01:20:42.395
is so terrifying for them
01:20:42.835 --> 01:20:47.395
except perhaps in their dreams,
when they indulge in fantasies.
01:20:52.915 --> 01:20:56.115
But, because I live openly and freely,
01:20:57.795 --> 01:21:00.315
I think they become terrified.
01:21:00.795 --> 01:21:05.435
The so-called free women
we're always hearing about,
01:21:06.516 --> 01:21:08.995
they can't be quite normal
01:21:10.675 --> 01:21:16.555
but they can become normal
if they discover their real capacity.
01:21:18.195 --> 01:21:20.916
Half an hour before she came
01:21:21.876 --> 01:21:24.115
and she just smiles
as she passes by...
01:21:27.115 --> 01:21:28.955
with another man.
01:21:33.396 --> 01:21:34.635
Oh, damn!
01:21:55.195 --> 01:21:58.356
Finally I finished, exhausted.
01:21:59.435 --> 01:22:03.395
I had brought out a lot
of the first impression,
01:22:06.075 --> 01:22:08.195
the trembling mouth,
01:22:08.875 --> 01:22:13.435
the transparent shine
and the tired eyes
01:22:15.075 --> 01:22:18.795
but the colours were not finished.
01:22:19.595 --> 01:22:24.955
It was pale and Grey.
The painting was heavy as lead.
01:22:29.435 --> 01:22:33.595
At almost the last stage,
Munch attacks the canvas again
01:22:33.675 --> 01:22:35.995
scoring deep into the oil
01:22:36.075 --> 01:22:39.995
and, in one gesture of
broad sweeping strokes
01:22:40.075 --> 01:22:44.355
eliminates the carefully executed
window, curtains and flowerpot
01:22:44.435 --> 01:22:46.995
on the right-hand side
of the canvas.
01:22:47.835 --> 01:22:49.795
The final distracting details
01:22:50.315 --> 01:22:51.715
have gone.
01:23:39.635 --> 01:23:42.915
Edvard Munch is aware that
he has made a major breakthrough
01:23:43.435 --> 01:23:45.555
in terms of his own art.
01:23:45.635 --> 01:23:49.435
But he is not yet aware of
the dimensions of this breakthrough.
01:23:50.435 --> 01:23:52.995
At this time, in the mid 1880's
01:23:53.395 --> 01:23:55.995
each of the major artists
in the Western World
01:23:56.635 --> 01:24:01.835
is still involved in the traditional
presentation of the exterior reality.
01:24:01.915 --> 01:24:03.434
Cézanne...
01:24:03.515 --> 01:24:07.435
the early work of Gauguin
and, even at this stage...
01:24:07.555 --> 01:24:09.595
Vincent Van Gogh.
01:24:10.795 --> 01:24:13.875
The difference between these works
and Munch's canvas
01:24:13.955 --> 01:24:15.755
is most clearly seen in
01:24:15.835 --> 01:24:18.275
the contemporary presentation
of young women:
01:24:18.355 --> 01:24:20.035
Auguste Renoir...
01:24:20.635 --> 01:24:22.115
Berthe Morisot...
01:24:23.555 --> 01:24:25.035
the American Mary Cassatt...
01:24:26.474 --> 01:24:28.435
the Norwegian Hans Heyerdahl.
01:24:29.875 --> 01:24:34.675
But Edvard Munch's canvas,
with its deeply scored surface,
01:24:34.755 --> 01:24:37.635
which has transcended
all exterior reality
01:24:38.075 --> 01:24:42.355
to become the first
expressionist painting of "feeling"
01:24:42.435 --> 01:24:46.115
in the history of Western art,
is strongly attacked
01:24:46.435 --> 01:24:50.035
both by the Kristiania public
and by its conservative press.
01:24:56.355 --> 01:25:00.835
The public won't accept
that sort of madness.
01:25:00.915 --> 01:25:02.795
When one passes
01:25:02.915 --> 01:25:06.675
people stand laughing
at the painting.
01:25:06.794 --> 01:25:12.315
Some people always set themselves up
as guardians over others.
01:25:12.834 --> 01:25:17.595
In literature they decide
what is decent and indecent.
01:25:18.475 --> 01:25:23.114
Says one colleague to Munch,
"I think that your painting is shit."
01:25:23.435 --> 01:25:26.435
Asks another,
"What are all those strokes for?
01:25:26.515 --> 01:25:28.355
"It looks like it's raining."
01:25:28.435 --> 01:25:31.235
A human life is decent
01:25:31.354 --> 01:25:34.555
but writing about
human sexual life is indecent.
01:25:34.634 --> 01:25:38.035
Another friend tells Munch
that he will go mad
01:25:38.115 --> 01:25:39.714
if he continues in this way.
01:25:39.795 --> 01:25:42.195
As long as I can write,
01:25:42.314 --> 01:25:46.195
I'll combat society and its rules
to create a society
01:25:46.315 --> 01:25:49.195
in which literature is free.
01:25:49.275 --> 01:25:52.874
Who has the right to stop anyone
writing about his emotional life?
01:25:53.235 --> 01:25:54.915
No one!
01:25:54.995 --> 01:26:01.475
The best way to judge Munch's picture
is to see it at a distance.
01:26:02.435 --> 01:26:05.875
Andreas Aubert, art historian
and critic.
01:26:05.955 --> 01:26:11.595
The colours and contours appear
most clearly on cloudy days.
01:26:12.354 --> 01:26:16.194
If one really wants
to get a better impression
01:26:16.915 --> 01:26:20.475
of this extremely strange painting,
01:26:20.555 --> 01:26:24.115
one should look at it like this,
between two fingers.
01:26:25.674 --> 01:26:28.355
At some point in this period
of his life
01:26:28.435 --> 01:26:33.035
Edvard Munch writes in his diary
of chasing a woman through the streets
01:26:33.115 --> 01:26:35.515
whom he believes to be Mrs Heiberg.
01:26:35.595 --> 01:26:40.035
I'm faltering. I think I am falling.
01:26:41.115 --> 01:26:46.435
But he has been lured
into throwing away his talent
01:26:46.514 --> 01:26:49.355
in such a useless way
01:26:50.115 --> 01:26:56.514
and encouraged to follow
this path which leads nowhere.
01:26:57.795 --> 01:27:02.675
I have no feeling in my legs.
They won't carry me.
01:27:03.995 --> 01:27:08.034
Everyone passing looks
alien and strange.
01:27:08.994 --> 01:27:11.915
I think they are all staring at me.
01:27:13.315 --> 01:27:16.195
My whole body is shaking.
01:27:16.315 --> 01:27:18.275
Sweat pours from me.
01:27:19.115 --> 01:27:23.954
I have received an anonymous letter
in my capacity as critic
01:27:24.035 --> 01:27:29.434
in which the writer claims to see
nothing but meaninglessness
01:27:29.515 --> 01:27:36.315
and an attempt to be original
in Munch's work.
01:27:36.395 --> 01:27:40.115
All I can say to this person
is that he get himself
01:27:40.235 --> 01:27:42.355
a new pair of eyes.
01:27:43.475 --> 01:27:47.875
Anyone who can't see that
here we have a great
01:27:47.995 --> 01:27:51.075
and genuine talent,
has no right
01:27:51.195 --> 01:27:52.634
to judge art at all.
01:28:03.235 --> 01:28:07.675
I want life, that which is alive.
01:28:09.634 --> 01:28:13.675
What do I care whether
the chair is properly made?
01:28:15.035 --> 01:28:21.075
What I wanted to bring out is
what cannot be measured.
01:28:22.355 --> 01:28:27.915
The tired movement
in the eyes, in the eyelids.
01:28:28.595 --> 01:28:31.994
The lips must seem
to have whispered something.
01:28:32.394 --> 01:28:38.235
It must have been painted
by one almost mentally deranged
01:28:39.514 --> 01:28:43.634
who sees hallucinations
as if in a fever.
01:28:45.875 --> 01:28:50.595
I lay down on a sofa in the corner.
I lay half asleep.
01:28:51.395 --> 01:28:53.595
I hated them for looking at me.
01:28:54.275 --> 01:29:01.515
It is possible that Munch can speak
in some way or other
01:29:02.195 --> 01:29:06.235
to those with a sick emotional life.
01:29:06.794 --> 01:29:13.035
But I think it's one of the most
dreadful things I've ever seen.
01:29:13.794 --> 01:29:23.315
One would have expected that
a painter who presents his paintings
01:29:23.394 --> 01:29:28.634
at a public exhibition,
would respect people's taste
01:29:28.995 --> 01:29:31.435
in a totally different way.
01:29:33.674 --> 01:29:37.554
Hurt and confused by the attack
on The Sick Child
01:29:37.635 --> 01:29:42.555
and by the constant references
to his work as "unfinished sketches"
01:29:42.634 --> 01:29:47.355
Edvard Munch now checks the advance
begun by his revolutionary painting
01:29:47.674 --> 01:29:49.034
and steps back.
01:29:59.715 --> 01:30:04.875
He paints a third self-portrait,
this time with eyes veiled
01:30:04.954 --> 01:30:08.755
a pose of defiance,
looking down on the viewer.
01:30:09.474 --> 01:30:13.435
A 2-year period of withdrawal
has begun.
01:30:17.515 --> 01:30:19.875
January 1888.
01:30:21.674 --> 01:30:24.955
By this period, the group
known as the Kristiania Boheme
01:30:25.035 --> 01:30:26.955
has begun to disintegrate.
01:30:27.474 --> 01:30:30.874
Personal tragedy, alcoholism,
syphilis
01:30:30.955 --> 01:30:34.555
scarring relationships,
social isolation
01:30:34.635 --> 01:30:36.794
have taken their toll.
01:30:36.875 --> 01:30:40.955
The writer Karl Jensen-Hjell
will die of stomach tuberculosis
01:30:41.034 --> 01:30:42.714
within a month.
01:30:42.794 --> 01:30:45.475
And six more of the young men
at this table
01:30:45.554 --> 01:30:48.434
many of them personal friends
of Munch
01:30:48.515 --> 01:30:51.034
will not reach the age of 40.
01:30:54.474 --> 01:30:57.354
Bertrand Hansen will die
of consumption.
01:30:59.595 --> 01:31:02.635
Jørgen Sørensen will die an invalid
01:31:02.714 --> 01:31:08.474
and the popular painter Kalle Løchen
will kill himself at the age of 28.
01:31:13.394 --> 01:31:17.475
Jæger himself, with the germs
of cancer in his body
01:31:17.554 --> 01:31:21.875
will die in 1910,
a pauper and an outcast.
01:31:22.835 --> 01:31:26.034
Outside the death room,
a debtor will be waiting
01:31:26.115 --> 01:31:28.555
to claim a bottle of whisky.
01:31:37.035 --> 01:31:39.074
The summer of 1888.
01:31:41.995 --> 01:31:45.555
Edvard Munch rents a cottage
in Åsgårdstrand
01:31:45.674 --> 01:31:48.954
near the village of Bone
on the Kristiania fjord.
01:31:54.314 --> 01:31:58.595
The affair of Oda Lasson
with Hans Jæger has ended.
01:31:59.354 --> 01:32:02.875
Oda Lasson is now married
to Christian Krohg.
01:32:08.394 --> 01:32:11.034
At the same time,
with Krohg's knowledge,
01:32:11.114 --> 01:32:14.755
Oda is developing the interest
of Jappe Nilssen
01:32:14.834 --> 01:32:20.435
age 18, student of French Literature,
friend of Edvard Munch.
01:32:27.034 --> 01:32:30.995
Inger Munch is now
a close friend of Sigurd Bødtker.
01:32:31.395 --> 01:32:36.715
Laura Munch, age 21,
remains unmarried.
01:32:39.755 --> 01:32:43.595
Why do you think
I shouted so angrily
01:32:46.434 --> 01:32:49.075
and said I couldn't see you again?
01:32:50.715 --> 01:32:52.674
It was because you lied!
01:32:56.154 --> 01:33:02.194
It's your inaccessibility
that makes me so angry!
01:33:09.274 --> 01:33:12.154
You said I shouldn't come so often.
01:33:12.795 --> 01:33:19.834
Yes, but then I didn't know
how much I liked you.
01:33:24.274 --> 01:33:29.714
You've forgotten me now.
You have someone else.
01:33:32.594 --> 01:33:34.234
I love you.
01:33:34.954 --> 01:33:41.755
If I'd only known that you went to
somebody else to punish me.
01:33:47.714 --> 01:33:56.314
It's the uncertainty that
makes me so nervous, so furious.
01:34:16.954 --> 01:34:19.554
You demand more and more
love from me.
01:34:19.634 --> 01:34:23.715
Don't you understand I can't
give you more than I have?
01:34:33.155 --> 01:34:37.275
The moment you show
your feelings, it seems like
01:34:37.354 --> 01:34:41.074
you want to take something stolen back.
01:34:43.035 --> 01:34:46.274
Is it for your art you save yourself?
01:34:55.795 --> 01:34:57.474
1888.
01:34:58.835 --> 01:35:01.874
August Strindberg writes
Miss Julie.
01:35:03.314 --> 01:35:07.035
The pneumatic Tyre and cordite
are invented.
01:35:09.074 --> 01:35:12.474
Vincent Van Gogh paints
Sunflowers
01:35:13.314 --> 01:35:15.074
The Drawbridge At Arles
01:35:15.714 --> 01:35:17.354
and The Sower.
01:35:18.314 --> 01:35:22.794
An unemployment demonstration
in Rome is suppressed by the military.
01:35:23.915 --> 01:35:25.794
And Wilhelm II
01:35:26.354 --> 01:35:28.315
becomes Emperor of Germany.
01:35:49.114 --> 01:35:52.354
Whilst he continues
to pursue Mrs Heiberg
01:35:52.435 --> 01:35:55.674
at the same time, Munch is trying
to escape from her.
01:35:56.914 --> 01:35:58.874
He begins to cultivate
his acquaintanceship
01:35:58.954 --> 01:36:01.874
with Åse Carlson, age 19
01:36:01.954 --> 01:36:07.034
herself a painter and engaged
to be married to a Kristiania lawyer.
01:36:07.714 --> 01:36:11.034
You need a woman
and yet you don't want one.
01:36:12.034 --> 01:36:17.194
I like you but we really
can't meet like this.
01:36:17.994 --> 01:36:20.914
You follow me everywhere.
You plague me.
01:36:33.954 --> 01:36:37.435
Munch writes in his diaries,
repeatedly
01:36:37.514 --> 01:36:40.754
of following Mrs Heiberg
to her rendezvous with other men...
01:36:43.875 --> 01:36:46.114
Jealousy is possessiveness.
01:36:46.194 --> 01:36:49.834
Your jealousy is driving me
to other love affairs.
01:36:50.434 --> 01:36:52.754
...of endlessly waiting.
01:36:56.194 --> 01:36:58.594
You can't own a woman.
01:36:59.474 --> 01:37:01.514
It's impossible.
01:37:30.674 --> 01:37:35.035
They kiss each other,
just now, at this moment,
01:37:36.754 --> 01:37:39.434
and she says she is fond of him.
01:37:40.954 --> 01:37:45.754
Hidden behind the stairs,
she whispers to the lieutenant
01:37:45.834 --> 01:37:49.834
the same words as she previously
whispered to him.
01:37:52.994 --> 01:37:55.354
It is probable that at this time
01:37:55.434 --> 01:37:59.354
Edvard Munch asks Åse Carlson
to marry him.
01:38:02.674 --> 01:38:06.434
Do you want to hold my hand?
I'm so alone.
01:38:08.034 --> 01:38:10.474
No, not here.
01:38:14.634 --> 01:38:17.874
You know that I like you, but...
01:38:19.794 --> 01:38:22.075
...more as a friend.
01:38:22.754 --> 01:38:24.714
Friendship is...
01:38:26.234 --> 01:38:31.274
Friendship is so little.
Life is short.
01:38:35.394 --> 01:38:37.474
In this winter of 1888
01:38:37.554 --> 01:38:41.034
after heavy drinking with friends
in the country near Slagen
01:38:41.114 --> 01:38:43.954
Munch is pushed into frozen water
01:38:44.034 --> 01:38:47.034
by an artist named
Palle Dørnberger
01:38:48.034 --> 01:38:49.754
and almost dies.
01:38:52.154 --> 01:38:55.634
This is very serious.
We should notify them.
01:38:56.874 --> 01:39:02.074
On the left is Dørnberger's sister,
Charlotte, age 20.
01:39:03.874 --> 01:39:06.714
I don't know where they live.
01:39:08.434 --> 01:39:11.314
I feel so young.
01:39:13.154 --> 01:39:18.994
I try to see life optimistically.
01:39:23.594 --> 01:39:26.634
We have different views on life.
01:39:28.074 --> 01:39:32.994
You seem a little gloomy.
01:39:36.554 --> 01:39:44.274
You seem weak,
a little tired of life.
01:39:44.834 --> 01:39:46.994
A feeling of tension
and loneliness
01:39:47.434 --> 01:39:50.034
now enters the canvases
of Edvard Munch.
01:39:50.394 --> 01:39:51.994
People appear still...
01:39:52.394 --> 01:39:53.434
immobile...
01:39:53.514 --> 01:39:56.954
often as though helpless
in the face of nature.
01:40:02.154 --> 01:40:04.834
I don't want to kiss you.
01:40:09.994 --> 01:40:13.234
They looked at each other
without speaking.
01:40:14.114 --> 01:40:20.074
At that moment he had a feeling
that life's greatest happiness
01:40:20.194 --> 01:40:21.954
had slipped from his grasp.
01:40:23.794 --> 01:40:26.154
There were tears in her eyes.
01:40:31.514 --> 01:40:36.394
Munch now prepares himself again
for the public and the critics
01:40:36.474 --> 01:40:40.394
often in the introvert company
of Sigbjørn Obstfelder, the poet
01:40:40.794 --> 01:40:43.874
and Jorgen Sørensen,
the crippled artist.
01:40:45.634 --> 01:40:47.474
April 1889.
01:40:47.554 --> 01:40:49.794
Edvard Munch again
faces the public...
01:40:52.514 --> 01:40:57.234
and to show exactly where he stands
and what he stands for
01:40:57.314 --> 01:41:00.514
exhibits everything
he has ever created:
01:41:00.594 --> 01:41:04.434
110 canvases and
innumerable drawings.
01:41:05.314 --> 01:41:08.713
Dominating the exhibition
is a huge canvas.
01:41:09.314 --> 01:41:13.834
Entitled Spring, it is a re-working
of The Sick Child.
01:41:14.473 --> 01:41:17.674
But gone now is
the loose expressive brushstroke
01:41:17.754 --> 01:41:19.114
of the earlier work.
01:41:19.594 --> 01:41:21.994
Here, there is minute detail:
01:41:22.433 --> 01:41:24.073
a strand of hair
01:41:24.514 --> 01:41:26.434
a blood stained handkerchief
01:41:26.514 --> 01:41:29.274
a carefully outlined bottle and vase
01:41:29.754 --> 01:41:31.794
the detailed top of a cupboard
01:41:31.914 --> 01:41:34.434
and even the pot of flowers.
01:41:34.514 --> 01:41:36.994
Have you seen Miss C.
since she married?
01:41:38.874 --> 01:41:42.234
I expect things are difficult for you.
01:41:42.313 --> 01:41:46.713
It must feel strange
when you think of her.
01:41:46.794 --> 01:41:53.794
Why has Munch's work changed
so much since The Sick Child?
01:41:54.514 --> 01:41:58.394
I can only guess something
must have happened to him,
01:41:58.474 --> 01:42:02.274
which made him lose faith
in himself and his art,
01:42:02.714 --> 01:42:05.954
poor criticism and other factors.
01:42:15.434 --> 01:42:19.194
Society accepts
that a man has a mistress
01:42:25.793 --> 01:42:29.353
but, if a woman has a lover,
it's quite different.
01:42:33.554 --> 01:42:37.434
Later perhaps...
Perhaps we can meet then.
01:42:39.314 --> 01:42:42.554
Everything could be different.
01:42:45.594 --> 01:42:48.234
We mustn't take it so casually.
01:42:49.113 --> 01:42:53.034
If I marry, I must live
for my husband.
01:42:54.114 --> 01:42:59.074
A woman often marries
because she needs to be supported.
01:42:59.554 --> 01:43:02.634
She can't earn what
she needs to live.
01:43:24.874 --> 01:43:31.913
What was she thinking
as she sleepwalked along?
01:43:32.514 --> 01:43:35.154
A Madonna-like beauty.
01:43:40.553 --> 01:43:44.874
That's the way it goes,
year after year, a sort of trap.
01:43:45.994 --> 01:43:50.553
Having now promised
to live together in matrimony
01:43:51.154 --> 01:43:56.873
and vouchsafed it before God and
this congregation, I declare you...
01:43:58.194 --> 01:44:04.714
Was she now thinking also
of the pale man behind the column?
01:44:05.194 --> 01:44:07.114
...and the Holy Ghost. Amen.
01:44:07.674 --> 01:44:09.394
What God has joined together,
01:44:09.473 --> 01:44:11.834
let no man put asunder.
01:44:15.913 --> 01:44:20.834
The affair between Jappe Nilssen
and Oda Krohg is now developing.
01:44:22.034 --> 01:44:25.034
Åsgårdstrand, 1889.
01:44:27.274 --> 01:44:31.794
She forced her way
between me and my ideal,
01:44:31.914 --> 01:44:32.834
my art!
01:44:34.713 --> 01:44:37.033
Yet I can't stop loving her.
01:44:39.994 --> 01:44:42.154
I can't put up with
01:44:42.273 --> 01:44:44.234
any more of her lies!
01:44:46.594 --> 01:44:48.433
Her love is poisonous!
01:44:50.834 --> 01:44:51.834
She has feelings, too.
01:44:52.194 --> 01:44:54.514
I don't give a damn!
01:44:54.794 --> 01:44:59.794
Damn it, I said to her,
you're lying on white sheets.
01:45:00.434 --> 01:45:04.073
Your body will be deformed
by disease and rot.
01:45:07.073 --> 01:45:10.354
You're going to die
ugly and stinking!
01:45:10.834 --> 01:45:16.194
I'll laugh while I drink wine
with beautiful women.
01:45:17.113 --> 01:45:23.833
My joy will be even greater than
the despair she brought.
01:45:24.274 --> 01:45:27.393
I shall laugh, laugh,
laugh!
01:46:08.154 --> 01:46:09.714
We wish to thank
the men, women and children
01:46:09.794 --> 01:46:11.953
of Oslo and Åsgårdstrand
who appear in this film.
01:46:40.314 --> 01:46:44.794
We are very grateful
for invaluable help from
01:46:44.914 --> 01:46:50.434
Additional thanks
01:46:50.554 --> 01:46:53.513
We wish to thank the staff at
the Munch Museum in Oslo
01:46:53.594 --> 01:46:56.914
without whose help this film
could not have been made.
01:46:57.034 --> 01:46:59.393
Directed and Edited by PETER WATKINS
and written in collaboration
01:46:59.474 --> 01:47:01.914
with the cast, many of whom express
their own opinions.
01:47:15.433 --> 01:47:18.154
Hurt and angered by
the continuing viciousness
01:47:18.274 --> 01:47:20.273
of the Kristiania critics
01:47:20.393 --> 01:47:24.793
seeking to escape from the pain
of his personal existence in Norway
01:47:24.913 --> 01:47:28.233
Edvard Munch leaves
for France, to study art.
01:47:36.833 --> 01:47:41.474
He meets with Emmanuel Goldstein,
a 27 year-old Danish poet
01:47:41.754 --> 01:47:46.234
whose own work bears
a disillusioned view on love.
01:47:46.394 --> 01:47:49.753
Munch shares a room
with Goldstein in St. Cloud
01:47:49.873 --> 01:47:53.313
outside Paris,
on the first floor above a cafe
01:47:53.674 --> 01:47:55.753
overlooking the river Seine.
01:47:56.473 --> 01:47:59.233
November 1889.
01:47:59.994 --> 01:48:06.993
Dr Munch's death was
a hard blow to the family.
01:48:08.553 --> 01:48:12.633
We had just moved to Hauketo
01:48:14.833 --> 01:48:18.874
and Dr Munch liked it
very much out here.
01:48:20.514 --> 01:48:24.114
The Sunday before he became ill
01:48:27.073 --> 01:48:30.714
we took a walk home from the church
01:48:30.993 --> 01:48:35.113
and the rest of us could not
keep pace with him.
01:48:37.873 --> 01:48:41.394
Now that he and his father
can never be reconciled
01:48:41.674 --> 01:48:45.474
Edvard Munch begins to re-assess
the values and beliefs
01:48:45.794 --> 01:48:48.674
that Hans Jæger has taught him.
01:48:50.673 --> 01:48:55.193
There is a city in the city,
the city of the dead.
01:48:55.593 --> 01:48:58.833
There the graves lie side by side.
01:48:59.393 --> 01:49:03.034
There you'll find hovels and palaces.
01:49:03.994 --> 01:49:07.633
There quiet people live, the dead.
01:49:10.153 --> 01:49:12.234
It's a popular city.
01:49:13.553 --> 01:49:15.633
The bones make way for new.
01:49:16.993 --> 01:49:19.193
What does it matter if one dies?
01:49:19.433 --> 01:49:22.593
"Naught but sorrow and torment,
misery and strife.
01:49:23.273 --> 01:49:26.313
"There is not much more
to be had from life.
01:49:26.514 --> 01:49:29.833
"You pay a price too high
for joys too brief.
01:49:30.354 --> 01:49:33.593
"Our pleasures are bought
by torment and grief.
01:49:33.953 --> 01:49:36.593
"If to love's pleasure
your body surrenders
01:49:36.993 --> 01:49:40.833
"The source of all pains
a new life is engendered."
01:49:44.953 --> 01:49:46.753
1889.
01:49:46.873 --> 01:49:51.153
The Eiffel Tower is built and the
box camera comes into production.
01:49:51.393 --> 01:49:54.873
Vincent Van Gogh paints
Landscape with Olive Trees
01:49:55.073 --> 01:49:57.993
and Wheat Field with Cypresses.
01:49:59.353 --> 01:50:01.754
And Adolf Hitler is born.
01:50:04.193 --> 01:50:07.273
In French literature,
the "symbolists" hold
01:50:07.433 --> 01:50:09.353
full sway in Paris.
01:50:09.473 --> 01:50:13.473
Verlaine, Huysmans,
the poet Mallarmé.
01:50:14.193 --> 01:50:16.034
A rebellion against Naturalism
01:50:16.233 --> 01:50:19.154
is now taking place
in the French capital.
01:50:23.154 --> 01:50:24.394
Amongst the painters
01:50:24.794 --> 01:50:28.873
the older generation has already
paved the way for the breakthrough.
01:50:29.034 --> 01:50:31.153
Puvis de Chavannes...
01:50:31.313 --> 01:50:33.073
Gustave Moreau...
01:50:33.154 --> 01:50:34.153
and Odilon Radon
01:50:35.153 --> 01:50:38.753
who emphasises the role
played by the sub-conscious
01:50:38.914 --> 01:50:41.073
in an artist's work.
01:50:42.513 --> 01:50:44.554
When I light the lamp
01:50:44.713 --> 01:50:47.113
I suddenly see my own
enormous shadow
01:50:47.274 --> 01:50:48.753
over the entire wall
01:50:48.913 --> 01:50:50.594
up to the ceiling.
01:50:50.874 --> 01:50:54.113
In the mirror above
the fireplace I see myself
01:50:54.274 --> 01:50:56.153
the face of my own ghost
01:50:58.554 --> 01:51:00.793
and I live with the dead.
01:51:10.874 --> 01:51:14.714
All it said was, "Dearest,
come at 8 o'clock tomorrow."
01:51:15.353 --> 01:51:20.634
I stared at each letter, each stain,
for the marks of her fingers.
01:51:22.473 --> 01:51:24.913
Did she love me
or was she pretending?
01:51:26.073 --> 01:51:30.074
Did she love me or the other
or both at the same time?
01:51:37.593 --> 01:51:38.994
"You are the vampire
01:51:39.473 --> 01:51:42.073
"which sucks my sparkling blood,
01:51:42.274 --> 01:51:44.393
"from the channels of my heart
01:51:44.474 --> 01:51:46.674
"with icy draining looks.
01:51:48.553 --> 01:51:52.593
"My body glows like desert sand
burned and charred
01:51:52.833 --> 01:51:55.073
"and the dry Sirocco
of madness rages
01:51:55.673 --> 01:51:57.633
"and my blood flows."
01:52:03.873 --> 01:52:08.233
Munch now sees the work
of Auguste Rodin in Paris.
01:52:11.593 --> 01:52:15.593
We didn't even know each other
and yet was it because
01:52:17.394 --> 01:52:22.033
she took my first kiss that she took
the fragrance of life from me?
01:52:23.473 --> 01:52:26.713
Was it because she
lied and deceived
01:52:28.514 --> 01:52:29.793
that she suddenly
01:52:29.874 --> 01:52:32.113
took the scales from my eyes?
01:52:35.273 --> 01:52:38.193
Munch now begins to formulate
the artistic philosophy
01:52:38.353 --> 01:52:41.313
that he is to pursue
all his life
01:52:41.433 --> 01:52:45.313
to understand and express
the purpose of man's existence
01:52:45.433 --> 01:52:47.393
of woman's existence
01:52:47.753 --> 01:52:51.274
the purpose for their pain,
their love, their despair
01:52:51.393 --> 01:52:57.034
links in an endless chain tying
together thousands of generations.
01:53:05.153 --> 01:53:10.353
There was to be no more painting
interiors, people reading and knitting
01:53:11.034 --> 01:53:16.833
but living people who breathe,
feel, suffer and love.
01:53:44.634 --> 01:53:48.073
She closes her eyes and listens
01:53:48.353 --> 01:53:52.314
to the words he whispers
into her long hair.
01:53:52.994 --> 01:53:57.833
I'd depict it as I saw it now,
but in the blue haze.
01:53:58.593 --> 01:54:04.993
I remember something Munch
once said a couple of years ago.
01:54:05.754 --> 01:54:11.673
He had discovered that the Greeks
regarded death as blue.
01:54:12.993 --> 01:54:19.033
It says somewhere in The Iliad,
"Blue death closes his eyes."
01:54:20.313 --> 01:54:25.753
"Here in the Grey gloomy North,"
Munch said, "we see death as black.
01:54:26.353 --> 01:54:32.713
"But in sunny Hellas
they regard it as blue.
01:54:33.353 --> 01:54:36.033
"Why shouldn't it be blue?"
01:55:03.833 --> 01:55:08.793
Those at home, my aunt,
my brother and sisters
01:55:10.073 --> 01:55:12.673
think that death is just sleep,
01:55:13.233 --> 01:55:16.913
that my father sees and hears.
01:55:17.073 --> 01:55:25.713
On Monday he suffered a stroke
and within a few days
01:55:26.673 --> 01:55:31.633
he lost the power of speech
and then consciousness.
01:55:33.273 --> 01:55:38.433
Now and then we think he recognised us
for he smiled and pressed our hands.
01:55:40.313 --> 01:55:44.673
I can do nothing
but let my sorrow run out
01:55:44.873 --> 01:55:49.633
into the dawn and into the dusk.
01:55:51.713 --> 01:55:54.833
Munch's painting
Night in St. Cloud
01:55:55.153 --> 01:55:59.993
a study of despondency in
swirling blue and black silhouette
01:56:00.113 --> 01:56:01.873
is a major breakthrough
01:56:01.993 --> 01:56:06.833
in parallel to the similar breakthrough
now occurring in Norwegian literature
01:56:07.193 --> 01:56:10.793
a subjective and personal
form of art.
01:56:10.833 --> 01:56:15.673
The use of the first person
in literature is introversive art
01:56:15.993 --> 01:56:23.233
which breaks with naturalism
in a psychological, mysterious way.
01:56:24.113 --> 01:56:28.953
Things can be said in the first person
which were unsaid before.
01:56:29.593 --> 01:56:30.593
This form
01:56:30.713 --> 01:56:34.753
is born of a desire
to get right to the bottom
01:56:34.953 --> 01:56:39.193
of the human being,
or the mood one is faced with.
01:56:40.753 --> 01:56:45.433
It becomes like a vision
or hallucination
01:56:46.193 --> 01:56:47.833
and it would be strange
01:56:47.913 --> 01:56:54.753
if this form of intensity did not
make people shudder and tremble
01:56:55.952 --> 01:57:00.313
and listen to what
the poet wants to say.
01:57:01.153 --> 01:57:05.033
There is a rupture between
the comprehensive view of realism
01:57:05.153 --> 01:57:09.433
and the new personal form.
Art for the sake of art
01:57:09.593 --> 01:57:12.433
and for the satisfaction of the artist.
01:57:13.512 --> 01:57:17.113
At last someone is willing
to listen to the heart.
01:57:19.713 --> 01:57:21.833
September 1890.
01:57:21.993 --> 01:57:24.193
As proof of his work in Paris
01:57:24.313 --> 01:57:26.672
Edvard Munch submits 10 paintings
01:57:26.793 --> 01:57:30.953
to the official State Autumn
Exhibition in Kristiania.
01:57:31.233 --> 01:57:34.673
The painting which he calls
Night in St. Cloud
01:57:34.793 --> 01:57:36.393
is heavily attacked.
01:57:37.833 --> 01:57:39.393
For the second time
01:57:39.513 --> 01:57:43.193
Edvard Munch returns
to self-exile in Europe.
01:57:43.993 --> 01:57:47.633
This painting which is called Night
01:57:48.673 --> 01:57:53.832
makes such demands
on one's ability to guess
01:57:54.033 --> 01:57:59.592
that few people go to the trouble
of studying it more closely.
01:58:00.353 --> 01:58:05.273
The atmosphere around the painting
is so faintly designated
01:58:05.713 --> 01:58:09.872
that it seems to disappear
before one can grasp it.
01:58:11.792 --> 01:58:19.593
The painter himself follows
his own path in a misty
01:58:19.833 --> 01:58:22.393
and shapeless world of dreams.
01:58:23.673 --> 01:58:29.553
And the critic of Aftenposten refers
to Munch's "sick mind" and states that:
01:58:29.673 --> 01:58:35.233
"the borderline between madness and
genius is unconscionably narrow."
01:58:35.433 --> 01:58:37.513
Munch is primarily
01:58:37.833 --> 01:58:40.313
a lyric poet in colour.
01:58:41.033 --> 01:58:46.033
He feels colours, feels in colours
but he does not see them.
01:58:46.513 --> 01:58:48.193
He sees sorrow
01:58:48.353 --> 01:58:50.793
and crying and brooding
01:58:51.113 --> 01:58:52.513
and withering.
01:58:54.153 --> 01:58:56.753
To the young poets
and writers of Norway
01:58:56.873 --> 01:58:59.112
now rejecting Naturalism
01:58:59.433 --> 01:59:02.833
the work of Edvard Munch
proves a revelation.
01:59:03.153 --> 01:59:04.752
Wilhelm Krag:
01:59:04.793 --> 01:59:11.273
"The river flows so slowly
Flows and flows and flows.
01:59:12.073 --> 01:59:15.032
"And daylight goes, goes.
01:59:15.633 --> 01:59:18.233
"Night will soon be here.
01:59:19.513 --> 01:59:22.233
"The light shines out of my room.
01:59:22.873 --> 01:59:27.833
"Turns to regard me
in silence and in anxiety.
01:59:28.393 --> 01:59:29.712
"It knows he is coming."
01:59:31.352 --> 01:59:34.953
Was it that she was so much
more beautiful than others?
01:59:35.553 --> 01:59:39.353
No, I don't even know
if she was beautiful.
01:59:40.193 --> 01:59:44.433
Her mouth was big.
She could be ugly.
01:59:46.353 --> 01:59:49.353
In my article in the
Mercure de France
01:59:49.353 --> 01:59:51.632
Albert Aurier, critic.
01:59:51.753 --> 01:59:54.112
I refer to this work by Gauguin.
01:59:54.273 --> 01:59:59.833
I explain that it is the duty
of the new artist to choose between
01:59:59.993 --> 02:00:03.113
the numerous elements
which make up objectivity.
02:00:03.312 --> 02:00:07.152
He is also entitled to distort,
to emphasise,
02:00:07.313 --> 02:00:12.072
to exaggerate line, form and colour
02:00:12.473 --> 02:00:15.073
in accordance with
his personal vision
02:00:15.353 --> 02:00:17.473
and individual subjectivity.
02:00:18.353 --> 02:00:20.753
Nice, 1891.
02:00:21.433 --> 02:00:26.273
Two lovers, their faces
dissolved together, featureless
02:00:26.393 --> 02:00:29.153
lurk in the comer of a room.
02:00:29.273 --> 02:00:31.152
Perspective has vanished.
02:00:31.272 --> 02:00:35.272
Broken, slashing strokes
of thin paint.
02:00:35.392 --> 02:00:37.992
The breakthrough has begun.
02:00:40.233 --> 02:00:43.433
She was affected,
a liar and a whore!
02:00:49.713 --> 02:00:54.872
The affair between Oda Krohg and
Jappe Nilssen is now at crisis point.
02:00:55.033 --> 02:00:58.312
Jappe wants his relationship
to be clearly defined.
02:00:58.432 --> 02:01:01.833
She, still married,
feels differently.
02:01:02.393 --> 02:01:07.072
Jappe is now taking drugs
and has threatened to kill himself.
02:01:08.872 --> 02:01:17.232
There seem to be rules demanding
that women sacrifice themselves.
02:01:18.233 --> 02:01:22.113
The best thing one can say
about a woman
02:01:22.273 --> 02:01:24.953
is that she is self-sacrificing.
02:01:26.633 --> 02:01:28.592
I can't put up with it anymore.
02:01:30.713 --> 02:01:34.153
I am so fond of her but
why is she so angry with me?
02:01:38.993 --> 02:01:41.112
It's so difficult at times.
02:01:41.393 --> 02:01:43.873
I know that I lose control.
02:01:49.072 --> 02:01:53.152
Seeking a way of peeling down
to the essence of the inner reality
02:01:53.233 --> 02:01:56.793
of stripping away needless
detail and perspective
02:01:56.953 --> 02:02:00.913
Munch now combines all
the forms of media at his disposal
02:02:01.033 --> 02:02:04.233
using pencil, pastel,
oil and charcoal
02:02:04.353 --> 02:02:07.032
not separately, but together.
02:02:09.352 --> 02:02:11.112
He applies the oil thinly
02:02:11.433 --> 02:02:13.192
to permit the canvas texture
02:02:13.312 --> 02:02:16.472
to remain a visible component
of the finished work
02:02:16.752 --> 02:02:18.832
to emphasise its flat surface.
02:02:19.352 --> 02:02:23.113
He allows the preliminary drawings
in pencil and pastel
02:02:23.192 --> 02:02:25.313
including the corrections
made in them
02:02:25.433 --> 02:02:29.993
to remain in the final work
to show its spontaneity.
02:02:33.232 --> 02:02:36.993
On this canvas, to be known
variously as Melancholy
02:02:37.192 --> 02:02:39.952
Evening or The Yellow Boat
02:02:40.072 --> 02:02:43.393
Munch is attempting,
for the first time in his work
02:02:43.713 --> 02:02:46.153
to depict jealousy.
02:02:46.473 --> 02:02:48.832
And not merely
the event of jealousy
02:02:48.992 --> 02:02:52.353
but its psychology
and innermost quiver.
02:02:56.713 --> 02:02:57.993
I wonder if something
02:02:58.432 --> 02:03:04.113
is going on between her
and Jæger. What shall I do then?
02:03:04.592 --> 02:03:07.673
At any rate, I believe
that the idea must be
02:03:09.992 --> 02:03:11.232
to live according to
02:03:11.393 --> 02:03:14.192
one's particular possibilities,
02:03:15.113 --> 02:03:18.273
that one has a duty to develop
02:03:18.513 --> 02:03:20.433
these possibilities,
02:03:22.432 --> 02:03:25.153
that one has a duty
to expand oneself,
02:03:26.552 --> 02:03:29.832
to acquire more knowledge,
a greater breadth.
02:03:30.993 --> 02:03:35.993
I think that leads to greater
freedom in the long run.
02:03:37.672 --> 02:03:40.152
Look how she's on top of it all.
02:03:40.793 --> 02:03:45.872
Cheerful and smiling,
while the men all lie and perish.
02:03:47.353 --> 02:03:51.672
Not everyone can have feelings
for each other all their lives.
02:03:53.393 --> 02:03:57.712
When a relationship no longer works,
one should be able to break it off
02:03:58.352 --> 02:04:04.952
before it changes to bitterness
and gnawing hate.
02:04:07.473 --> 02:04:11.712
This canvas marks a major development
in the work of Edvard Munch.
02:04:11.952 --> 02:04:15.912
It develops still further
the flat application of colour areas
02:04:16.033 --> 02:04:17.712
the lack of perspective
02:04:17.832 --> 02:04:20.752
the tension between
space and surface.
02:04:21.392 --> 02:04:25.392
It is dismissed by the critics
as a "sketch".
02:04:26.352 --> 02:04:30.352
Edvard Munch is now seeking to take
the practical artistic consequences
02:04:30.433 --> 02:04:34.352
of what lies behind
the theories of the symbolists.
02:04:35.193 --> 02:04:39.152
He wants to realise them
in all-powerful subjectivity
02:04:39.272 --> 02:04:44.312
to pass on what he and he alone
experiences from the motif
02:04:44.393 --> 02:04:47.792
at the very moment
that he grips it, or...
02:04:48.032 --> 02:04:49.792
that he is gripped by it.
02:04:50.112 --> 02:04:52.392
I walked along the road
with two friends.
02:04:52.753 --> 02:04:54.592
The sun went down.
02:04:55.552 --> 02:04:58.233
I felt it like a melancholy sigh.
02:04:59.552 --> 02:05:02.272
Suddenly the sky became blood red.
02:05:03.033 --> 02:05:04.273
I stopped.
02:05:04.953 --> 02:05:08.352
I leaned against the fence,
tired to death.
02:05:09.513 --> 02:05:11.352
I saw the flaming sky
02:05:11.553 --> 02:05:15.472
like blood, like a sword
over the fjord and the town.
02:05:16.272 --> 02:05:20.473
My friends continued on.
I stood there shaking in anguish.
02:05:21.872 --> 02:05:23.112
I felt it like
02:05:23.312 --> 02:05:25.872
a great endless scream
through nature.
02:05:28.993 --> 02:05:33.113
The German Kaiser visits London,
hoping that Britain will agree to
02:05:33.312 --> 02:05:36.113
the Triple Alliance
with Austria and Italy.
02:05:37.392 --> 02:05:42.912
There is civil war in Chile,
widespread famine in Russia.
02:05:52.912 --> 02:05:57.032
Munch now paints and exhibits
a portrait of his sister Inger.
02:05:57.353 --> 02:05:58.912
Another breakthrough.
02:05:59.033 --> 02:06:03.192
Perspective has vanished.
Space and surface are one.
02:06:03.793 --> 02:06:07.992
But this canvas and his work
known as Despair
02:06:08.193 --> 02:06:11.353
with the artist's featureless
and blank profile
02:06:11.872 --> 02:06:16.672
its large disconnected strokes of
heavy colour running over each other
02:06:17.032 --> 02:06:20.393
are heavily attacked
by the Norwegian press as
02:06:20.712 --> 02:06:24.872
"an awe-inspiring
gibberish of futuristic art."
02:06:29.753 --> 02:06:32.272
For reasons
which still remain unclear
02:06:32.392 --> 02:06:36.993
Edvard Munch is now formally invited
by the Berlin Art Association
02:06:37.153 --> 02:06:39.272
the Verein Berliner Künstler
02:06:39.392 --> 02:06:42.392
to arrange a one-man exhibition
of his work
02:06:42.672 --> 02:06:46.473
in their new exhibition hall,
the Architektenhaus
02:06:46.792 --> 02:06:49.873
a converted beer-parlour
on the Wilhelmstraße.
02:06:50.033 --> 02:06:53.033
On the 5th of November
the exhibition opens
02:06:53.193 --> 02:06:55.233
containing many of
Munch's latest paintings
02:06:55.992 --> 02:06:59.152
a total of fifty-five canvases.
02:07:00.193 --> 02:07:02.752
The Berlin press is here in force
02:07:02.872 --> 02:07:06.473
including Adolf Rosenberg,
of Kunstchronik
02:07:06.792 --> 02:07:10.952
and a representative from
the conservative National Zeitung.
02:07:11.872 --> 02:07:15.113
Here in the Berlin
of Kaiser Wilhelm II
02:07:15.232 --> 02:07:18.392
"impressionism"
is still a term of abuse.
02:07:18.792 --> 02:07:22.312
The Kaiser himself,
who once referred to Richard Wagner
02:07:22.432 --> 02:07:25.192
as "a cheap little conductor,"
02:07:25.352 --> 02:07:28.072
is dedicated to fighting
what he calls
02:07:28.192 --> 02:07:30.073
"the un-German type of art"
02:07:30.192 --> 02:07:33.032
or "art of the gutter."
02:07:38.352 --> 02:07:41.392
The entire exhibition is a mockery.
02:07:41.712 --> 02:07:43.113
Every painting!
02:07:43.832 --> 02:07:45.472
The man must be mad.
02:07:46.632 --> 02:07:48.632
The colours are so unnatural.
02:07:50.992 --> 02:07:54.392
Within a matter of days,
the exhibition of these paintings
02:07:54.753 --> 02:07:58.193
the like of which has never before
been seen in Germany
02:07:58.312 --> 02:08:01.473
has broken into a notorious scandal.
02:08:07.513 --> 02:08:09.552
We haven't had a revolution!
02:08:09.872 --> 02:08:14.872
Just think of people's reaction!
To invite someone who...
02:08:15.353 --> 02:08:17.232
Hermann Eschke, sculptor
02:08:17.393 --> 02:08:21.672
professor at the Berlin Academy of Art,
seen here in the foreground
02:08:22.152 --> 02:08:25.952
has raised a petition amongst
the conservative members of the Verein
02:08:26.112 --> 02:08:29.193
to force through
the immediate removal
02:08:29.712 --> 02:08:31.832
of Munch's "anarchistic smears."
02:08:32.952 --> 02:08:36.313
The conservative majority
is led by Anton Von Werner
02:08:36.432 --> 02:08:39.792
a painter of court and
battle scenes for the Kaiser.
02:08:39.912 --> 02:08:42.832
Von Werner, strongly attacked
by the liberals
02:08:43.193 --> 02:08:46.112
who refer to him as a
"boots and uniform" painter
02:08:46.992 --> 02:08:50.192
urges the removal
of Munch's "Schmiererei."
02:08:54.392 --> 02:08:57.072
This rubbish doesn't belong here.
02:09:05.792 --> 02:09:07.352
In opposition to these conservatives
02:09:08.112 --> 02:09:10.712
is the small caucus of liberal artists
02:09:10.832 --> 02:09:14.272
amongst them Ludwig Knaus
who argue
02:09:14.472 --> 02:09:17.873
not so much for Munch's
freedom of expression
02:09:17.992 --> 02:09:21.993
as against the social incorrectness
of the Berlin Academy
02:09:22.112 --> 02:09:24.992
for throwing out an invited guest.
02:09:29.872 --> 02:09:32.912
Amid reports
of anarchist activities in Paris
02:09:33.032 --> 02:09:35.713
and rising beer taxes in Bavaria
02:09:36.032 --> 02:09:39.392
the German newspapers headline
"the struggle taking place
02:09:39.672 --> 02:09:41.032
within the Verein."
02:09:48.352 --> 02:09:50.592
We must be united
on objective grounds.
02:09:51.272 --> 02:09:53.312
That's nonsense! No!
02:09:53.992 --> 02:09:56.712
We'll withdraw from the Society
02:09:56.912 --> 02:09:59.592
if the exhibition is closed down.
02:10:01.672 --> 02:10:04.392
On the 11th of November,
a conservative bloc carry
02:10:04.672 --> 02:10:07.673
the vote to close the exhibition
02:10:07.792 --> 02:10:11.832
and Munch is ordered
to remove his "Schmiererei."
02:10:12.992 --> 02:10:15.832
The Kunstchronik charges
Edvard Munch
02:10:15.992 --> 02:10:20.192
with "brutality, crudity
and baseness of expression."
02:10:20.833 --> 02:10:25.312
The National Zeitung accuses
"this man E. Blunch"
02:10:25.392 --> 02:10:29.832
of selling himself body and soul
to the French Impressionists.
02:10:31.712 --> 02:10:35.752
Edvard Munch has arrived
in Imperial Germany.
02:10:45.192 --> 02:10:49.352
One critic even states
that Munch knows next to nothing
02:10:49.472 --> 02:10:51.232
and should only exhibit
02:10:51.392 --> 02:10:55.032
if he is in dire peril
of dying of starvation.
02:10:59.112 --> 02:11:03.192
I went to the Rotunda for a laugh.
02:11:03.192 --> 02:11:06.832
Theodor Wolff,
editor of the Berliner Tageblatt.
02:11:09.792 --> 02:11:12.632
But, by God, I didn't laugh.
02:11:13.712 --> 02:11:20.032
I found a great deal that was
strange, even disgusting
02:11:20.792 --> 02:11:25.792
but I also found tones that
were delicate, almost too sensitive.
02:11:27.112 --> 02:11:32.352
A dark room washed through
with moonlight.
02:11:33.592 --> 02:11:35.792
Lonely roads.
02:11:36.872 --> 02:11:39.992
The secretive Norwegian
summer night.
02:11:41.352 --> 02:11:46.352
I felt as though I heard
the breathing of melancholy people
02:11:46.472 --> 02:11:49.032
struggling with their problems.
02:11:49.792 --> 02:11:52.432
No sound came from their breasts.
02:11:52.832 --> 02:11:55.672
They sat alone by the shore.
02:11:56.312 --> 02:11:58.232
By God, I did not laugh.
02:12:06.912 --> 02:12:10.072
Munch, choosing to be true
to his vision
02:12:10.192 --> 02:12:13.192
has painted the clouds
over the Kristiania fjord
02:12:13.352 --> 02:12:15.672
as he saw and felt them.
02:12:16.392 --> 02:12:20.232
He argues that if he experienced
clouds as blood
02:12:20.392 --> 02:12:22.312
during an agitated mood
02:12:22.472 --> 02:12:25.272
then that is how
he should paint them.
02:12:36.232 --> 02:12:39.792
Accompanied by his
"anarchistic Schmiererei"
02:12:39.952 --> 02:12:42.712
Edvard Munch moves into
the room of a hotel
02:12:42.832 --> 02:12:45.072
in the Charlottenburg
district of Berlin.
02:12:46.312 --> 02:12:50.152
Memories and images
stored for over 20 years
02:12:50.272 --> 02:12:52.312
are about to break forth.
02:12:53.192 --> 02:12:56.912
All that is needed
is one final catalyst.
02:12:57.992 --> 02:13:00.952
On the corner of Neue Wilhelmstraße
and Unter den Linden
02:13:01.072 --> 02:13:04.832
is a tavern, serving
over nine hundred kinds of liquor
02:13:04.992 --> 02:13:07.112
and nicknamed "The Black Pig"
02:13:07.392 --> 02:13:09.192
a meeting place for writers.
02:13:09.352 --> 02:13:13.112
Amongst them, now living in Berlin,
August Strindberg
02:13:13.192 --> 02:13:17.432
who holds court in "The Black Pig",
where, in the words of a historian
02:13:17.752 --> 02:13:21.912
"he is virtually a tourist attraction
for the intelligentsia."
02:13:23.152 --> 02:13:24.952
Laura Marholm, journalist
02:13:25.072 --> 02:13:28.352
who with her husband has given
financial aid to Strindberg
02:13:28.672 --> 02:13:33.152
a source of growing resentment to the
poverty-stricken Swedish celebrity.
02:13:33.352 --> 02:13:35.672
With Strindberg in this room
02:13:35.752 --> 02:13:39.232
are as many Scandinavians
as there are Germans.
02:13:40.312 --> 02:13:44.072
Christian Krohg, who has accompanied
his wife Oda to Berlin
02:13:44.192 --> 02:13:46.392
where he watches
her intense love affair
02:13:46.912 --> 02:13:49.991
with the Norwegian author
Gunnar Heiberg.
02:13:50.992 --> 02:13:55.392
Sigbjørn Obstfelder and,
next to him, Bengt Lidforss
02:13:56.112 --> 02:13:57.671
Swedish botanical student
02:13:57.792 --> 02:14:00.992
recently engaged
to a 12 year-old girl.
02:14:01.992 --> 02:14:05.392
Hermann Schlittgen,
painter and engraver.
02:14:06.952 --> 02:14:09.352
In this room, a centre
of the literary storm
02:14:09.432 --> 02:14:11.232
that is to sweep over Europe
02:14:11.472 --> 02:14:14.792
are those who have already
rejected Naturalism
02:14:14.912 --> 02:14:17.912
who are now seeking
an artistic or literary means
02:14:18.032 --> 02:14:21.312
of presenting the interior
macrocosm of the soul
02:14:22.072 --> 02:14:25.312
peering into
the darkest abyss of man.
02:14:25.472 --> 02:14:27.672
Here, in the words of a historian
02:14:27.792 --> 02:14:31.792
ideas change hands
"faster than mistresses."
02:14:31.912 --> 02:14:35.272
Here the writers feed upon
the staccato genius in their midst
02:14:36.392 --> 02:14:40.191
August Strindberg,
in self-exile from Sweden
02:14:40.312 --> 02:14:43.071
where he has been condemned
as a blasphemer
02:14:43.192 --> 02:14:46.832
where educationalists clamour
for the suppression of his books
02:14:46.992 --> 02:14:50.792
and where he is spat upon
by parents in the streets.
02:14:51.192 --> 02:14:53.832
Within this room, all is discussed:
02:14:53.992 --> 02:14:58.312
art, black magic, spiritualism,
the philosophy of Nietzsche
02:14:58.831 --> 02:15:01.952
the erotic work of
the Belgian etcher, Felicien Raps
02:15:02.072 --> 02:15:06.912
such as Thievery and
Prostitution Rule The World.
02:15:09.792 --> 02:15:13.832
Richard Dehmel, currently writing
a cycle of poems about sex
02:15:13.952 --> 02:15:18.912
their purpose to raise sexual love
to the level of religious mysticism
02:15:19.032 --> 02:15:20.392
shortly to be prosecuted
02:15:20.832 --> 02:15:24.792
because of his description
of a nun masturbating.
02:15:25.472 --> 02:15:27.152
Stanislaw Przybyszewski,
02:15:27.272 --> 02:15:30.032
Polish-German author
and medical student
02:15:30.192 --> 02:15:34.392
involved with the occult,
studies satanism
02:15:34.952 --> 02:15:38.232
who rewrote the opening
of the Gospel of St. John to read:
02:15:38.392 --> 02:15:41.112
"In the beginning there was sex..."
02:15:47.752 --> 02:15:49.392
And Edvard Munch
02:15:49.472 --> 02:15:52.191
famous overnight
as the centre of a storm
02:15:52.272 --> 02:15:56.232
that has rocked the German art world
to its very foundations.
02:15:56.392 --> 02:16:01.832
Already he has received invitations
to exhibit in Düsseldorf and Cologne
02:16:02.191 --> 02:16:05.272
and he has been prevailed upon
by the Berlin intellectuals
02:16:05.392 --> 02:16:08.791
to make his home here in Germany.
02:16:26.471 --> 02:16:28.192
Of all the men in this room
02:16:28.352 --> 02:16:32.312
two will have the most marked effect
upon the work of Edvard Munch.
02:16:33.232 --> 02:16:36.952
Stanislaw Przybyszewski
who is to later believe that
02:16:37.152 --> 02:16:39.152
his passionate interpretation
of Chopin
02:16:39.231 --> 02:16:42.152
will have more meaning
for German literature
02:16:42.352 --> 02:16:43.712
than all his writing
02:16:43.832 --> 02:16:46.472
and August Strindberg, divorced
02:16:46.791 --> 02:16:49.192
separated from the children
he adores
02:16:49.312 --> 02:16:52.832
who presents the "Black Pig"
with a triple credo:
02:16:53.231 --> 02:16:55.151
woman the inferior
02:16:55.352 --> 02:16:57.071
woman the whore
02:16:57.312 --> 02:17:00.672
woman the man-weakening vampire.
02:17:11.471 --> 02:17:17.832
There are paintings everywhere
in Munch's hotel room,
02:17:18.591 --> 02:17:22.991
on the sofa, on the cupboard
and on all the chairs,
02:17:23.712 --> 02:17:28.152
even on the stove
and on the washbasin.
02:17:47.752 --> 02:17:52.032
Amongst the group in "The Black Pig"
is Laura Marholm's husband
02:17:52.191 --> 02:17:54.352
the Swedish poet, Ola Hansson
02:17:54.872 --> 02:17:58.872
who has had to leave his country
following the reaction to his publication
02:17:59.272 --> 02:18:01.312
of a collection of short stories
02:18:01.671 --> 02:18:05.791
describing man's split
emotional sex life.
02:18:07.912 --> 02:18:12.071
Ola Hansson tells Munch that
he suffers from a fear of life
02:18:12.392 --> 02:18:13.991
constantly seeing "Death...
02:18:15.391 --> 02:18:18.192
following him like his own shadow."
02:18:18.432 --> 02:18:21.752
I have little faith in your struggle
02:18:21.951 --> 02:18:23.591
for emancipation.
02:18:24.472 --> 02:18:29.111
The equality which you strive for
means that I cut off my penis
02:18:29.272 --> 02:18:32.391
and you put it into yourself
and then we're all equal.
02:18:38.192 --> 02:18:40.712
Right now all women hate Buddhas,
02:18:40.871 --> 02:18:43.631
hate and humiliate them,
02:18:43.872 --> 02:18:48.831
well knowing that they will
never become Buddhas.
02:18:55.991 --> 02:19:01.392
Dagny Juel, age 26, daughter of
a Norwegian country doctor
02:19:01.471 --> 02:19:03.992
who has come to Berlin
to study the piano
02:19:04.152 --> 02:19:06.752
and who has been introduced
to "The Black Pig"
02:19:06.872 --> 02:19:09.711
by her family friend,
Edvard Munch.
02:19:13.192 --> 02:19:17.272
On the other hand, she feels
a sort of instinctive sympathy
02:19:17.391 --> 02:19:22.112
for beggars, braggarts,
liars and dogs,
02:19:22.311 --> 02:19:23.752
especially mangy ones.
02:19:26.311 --> 02:19:30.032
Under the eyes of Przybyszewski
who is in love with her
02:19:30.192 --> 02:19:33.431
Dagny Juel now becomes
the mistress of Edvard Munch.
02:19:34.152 --> 02:19:37.791
Being married is the only way
women have to survive.
02:19:37.992 --> 02:19:42.071
You simply can't exist
without a man.
02:19:44.472 --> 02:19:47.512
If we leave you,
you fall like ninepins.
02:19:52.432 --> 02:19:53.672
You want the women
02:19:53.831 --> 02:19:55.272
submitted to you.
02:19:57.431 --> 02:20:00.311
I can manage
with or without them.
02:20:00.431 --> 02:20:02.672
- Are you sure?
- Absolutely.
02:20:03.591 --> 02:20:06.392
Why is there a woman
beside you then?
02:20:34.672 --> 02:20:37.751
At this time, Edvard Munch
is beginning to suffer
02:20:37.911 --> 02:20:39.472
from agoraphobia,
02:20:39.872 --> 02:20:42.232
a fear of open spaces.
02:20:44.191 --> 02:20:48.112
He walks close to walls
and dreads to cross an open square.
02:20:51.431 --> 02:20:53.152
I do as I please.
02:20:59.391 --> 02:21:01.392
The year 1893.
02:21:01.871 --> 02:21:04.191
There is a general strike in Belgium
02:21:04.312 --> 02:21:07.432
serious riots
suppressed by the police.
02:21:07.992 --> 02:21:10.231
Hermann Göring is born.
02:21:10.391 --> 02:21:13.671
And Peter Iljich Tchaikovsky dies.
02:21:15.311 --> 02:21:17.992
Not the slightest artistic tradition
02:21:18.191 --> 02:21:22.552
or affinity with
accepted artistic ideals
02:21:22.792 --> 02:21:27.432
can be found in Blunch
or his colleagues.
02:21:33.271 --> 02:21:36.191
Here, in the Germany
of Kaiser Wilhelm II
02:21:36.392 --> 02:21:40.792
Edvard Munch begins work on the
subjective image of a naked woman
02:21:41.231 --> 02:21:45.751
seen as from the viewpoint of
her partner in sexual intercourse.
02:21:45.952 --> 02:21:49.471
Around her head,
the halo of a Madonna.
02:21:50.792 --> 02:21:53.711
For his exterior model,
Munch uses Dagny Juel.
02:21:56.991 --> 02:21:58.192
Dagny Juel...
02:21:58.791 --> 02:22:01.111
described by Strindberg as...
02:22:01.271 --> 02:22:05.872
"tall, thin, haggard
from liquor and late hours
02:22:06.351 --> 02:22:11.431
"speaking with a drawling voice
broken as if by swallowed tears
02:22:12.192 --> 02:22:17.191
"with the figure of a Madonna and
a laughter that drove men insane."
02:22:24.191 --> 02:22:26.391
Strindberg has discussed with Munch
02:22:26.712 --> 02:22:30.392
fear and distaste
at the idea of his sperm
02:22:30.672 --> 02:22:33.391
coming in contact with
the sperm of another man
02:22:33.751 --> 02:22:36.671
in the vagina
of their common mistress.
02:22:36.872 --> 02:22:39.911
He believes that this meeting
of similar poles
02:22:40.191 --> 02:22:42.791
sensual contact with another male
02:22:42.951 --> 02:22:45.191
is so unbearable and horrible
02:22:45.752 --> 02:22:50.152
that the normal man would often
even prefer death.
02:22:54.911 --> 02:22:59.072
"I run on. I am filled
with increasing anguish.
02:22:59.431 --> 02:23:02.871
"No one speaks to one another.
No one smiles at one another.
02:23:03.031 --> 02:23:05.272
"They rush off as though whipped."
02:23:13.551 --> 02:23:16.711
So it is difficult to distinguish
a human form
02:23:16.792 --> 02:23:21.191
or even to determine
the nature of an object at all.
02:23:29.151 --> 02:23:31.391
But he was so frightened.
02:23:32.471 --> 02:23:34.911
He felt the blood run
through his chest.
02:23:37.391 --> 02:23:38.992
1893.
02:23:39.191 --> 02:23:43.311
An army bill increases the size
of the German armed forces.
02:23:44.111 --> 02:23:49.272
An anarchist bomb explodes in
the Paris Chamber of Deputies.
02:23:50.951 --> 02:23:55.231
When he breathed it felt as though
his chest had come loose
02:23:55.992 --> 02:23:59.552
and all his blood poured
through his mouth.
02:24:03.591 --> 02:24:05.511
Jesus Christ!
02:24:08.391 --> 02:24:12.712
Strindberg has posed to Munch
the question, "What is jealousy?"
02:24:13.911 --> 02:24:15.872
and has answered
02:24:16.271 --> 02:24:19.151
"Jealousy is not
the fear of losing
02:24:19.271 --> 02:24:21.951
"but the fear of dividing."
02:24:24.392 --> 02:24:26.032
Przybyszewski feels differently.
02:24:26.432 --> 02:24:30.191
He believes that no man
should possess another human being
02:24:30.272 --> 02:24:33.471
and has even offered the key
of his apartment to Strindberg
02:24:33.911 --> 02:24:38.232
so that he may avail himself of
Przybyszewski's common-in-law wife.
02:24:38.991 --> 02:24:41.191
Strindberg has declined.
02:24:43.992 --> 02:24:45.391
Przybyszewski tells Munch
02:24:45.751 --> 02:24:49.191
that he believes sex
to be life's basic substance
02:24:49.391 --> 02:24:52.191
and the inner essence
of individuality
02:24:52.311 --> 02:24:56.671
the ever-creating, the transforming
and the destructive.
02:24:57.191 --> 02:25:00.671
Sex created the brain,
says Przybyszewski
02:25:00.951 --> 02:25:04.191
but between them there will
always be a constant fight
02:25:04.351 --> 02:25:08.791
that will inevitably lead
to death and destruction.
02:25:12.311 --> 02:25:15.832
Three years from now, in 1896
02:25:16.391 --> 02:25:20.431
Dagny Juel, accompanied
by Stanislaw Przybyszewski
02:25:21.151 --> 02:25:26.071
will travel to the Russian city
of Tiflis to meet with a lover
02:25:26.792 --> 02:25:29.311
who will shoot her through the head
02:25:29.672 --> 02:25:32.391
and then himself commit suicide.
02:25:39.871 --> 02:25:42.351
I feel better now.
02:25:42.631 --> 02:25:44.831
May I look out the window?
02:25:51.271 --> 02:25:54.031
Working simultaneously
on themes of love
02:25:54.191 --> 02:25:56.911
pain, despair and death
02:25:57.471 --> 02:26:00.711
searching for the ever-elusive
artistic solution
02:26:00.831 --> 02:26:03.151
to the expression of his feelings
02:26:03.711 --> 02:26:06.751
Edvard Munch turns now to tempera,
02:26:07.071 --> 02:26:10.391
the use of egg-white
to roughen the quality of the oil
02:26:10.711 --> 02:26:13.231
to flatten and condense the image.
02:26:13.832 --> 02:26:17.791
He begins a new canvas
depicting the death of his sister
02:26:17.911 --> 02:26:23.071
one of a series to deal with the
grief and isolation of his family...
02:26:23.951 --> 02:26:24.952
of himself.
02:26:29.671 --> 02:26:32.191
God bless you, my child.
02:26:33.751 --> 02:26:38.112
Munch depicts himself,
his brothers and sisters
02:26:38.231 --> 02:26:43.391
at the same age as if these events
were happening in the present.
02:26:49.311 --> 02:26:53.071
- Something to drink?
- Yes, please.
02:27:22.991 --> 02:27:24.991
Do you have a nice hotel room?
02:27:51.991 --> 02:27:54.351
What do you think of the girls?
02:28:01.551 --> 02:28:03.751
Perhaps you'd like a chubby girl?
02:28:10.791 --> 02:28:11.871
In her will
02:28:12.071 --> 02:28:13.791
Mother asked us
02:28:14.431 --> 02:28:18.431
to be good
02:28:19.591 --> 02:28:21.631
and to love Jesus.
02:28:23.951 --> 02:28:26.831
We all had to promise her
02:28:27.071 --> 02:28:31.591
that we would go on
believing in Jesus.
02:28:31.871 --> 02:28:33.911
I am so fond of the dark.
02:28:40.271 --> 02:28:45.031
Munch paints his Madonna with
what he calls "a corpse's smile"...
02:28:45.751 --> 02:28:47.751
the moment of conception.
02:28:47.831 --> 02:28:50.791
"Life shakes the hand of death."
02:29:04.711 --> 02:29:08.591
Is it the whole night
or only half an hour?
02:29:11.191 --> 02:29:12.271
The night.
02:29:12.471 --> 02:29:14.471
30 marks, please.
02:29:15.151 --> 02:29:17.831
At some time in this period,
Strindberg
02:29:17.991 --> 02:29:21.431
who is now courting
an Austrian woman living in Berlin
02:29:21.791 --> 02:29:24.471
takes Dagny Juel as his mistress.
02:29:24.911 --> 02:29:29.391
Referring to himself as "Andersson",
he writes in his notes:
02:29:29.791 --> 02:29:34.711
"Andersson liberates her from the
anxiety of a disorderly way of living.
02:29:34.871 --> 02:29:37.831
"The hollow cheeks are filled out
with fiery blood.
02:29:37.991 --> 02:29:40.951
"The creator admires his creation.
02:29:41.071 --> 02:29:46.191
"The painter is ignored
and accepts it without protest."
02:29:49.031 --> 02:29:50.831
Good you have time.
02:29:53.111 --> 02:29:54.991
It's much better.
02:30:03.191 --> 02:30:04.431
Thank you.
02:30:50.231 --> 02:30:54.751
"A kiss, a kiss is not a sin."
02:31:11.351 --> 02:31:14.111
Munch begins work on a canvas
02:31:14.231 --> 02:31:18.111
showing a woman bent over
the neck of a weakened man.
02:31:18.951 --> 02:31:23.191
He says of this painting that
"in reality, all it is
02:31:23.390 --> 02:31:27.791
"is a woman kissing a man
on the nape of the neck."
02:31:28.231 --> 02:31:31.391
He calls the painting
Love and Pain.
02:31:32.430 --> 02:31:36.071
But to Przybyszewski,
the work depicts Woman
02:31:36.191 --> 02:31:38.791
sucking the strength from a man.
02:31:39.111 --> 02:31:42.191
He re-titles the painting
The Vampire.
02:31:42.951 --> 02:31:46.071
Munch lets the new title stay.
02:31:56.990 --> 02:31:58.831
I need you.
02:32:01.671 --> 02:32:04.071
The woman known as Mrs Heiberg
02:32:04.191 --> 02:32:08.311
divorces her husband
on the 4th April 1891
02:32:08.991 --> 02:32:11.110
and remarries a month later.
02:32:11.871 --> 02:32:17.191
Her ex-husband, the doctor,
dies shortly afterwards.
02:32:20.310 --> 02:32:21.351
Well, Strindberg?
02:32:21.471 --> 02:32:25.031
What do you think of
love and marriage?
02:32:25.591 --> 02:32:28.270
Have you known love in marriage?
02:32:30.511 --> 02:32:35.151
- I can't see my children.
- Do you miss your children?
02:32:36.791 --> 02:32:40.831
- Yes, very much.
- Is that love?
02:32:44.590 --> 02:32:47.071
All women are bloody whores.
02:32:53.711 --> 02:32:55.311
February 1893.
02:32:55.871 --> 02:32:58.071
Edvard Munch is in Copenhagen.
02:32:58.191 --> 02:33:01.271
The first exposure of his work
in Denmark.
02:33:01.431 --> 02:33:03.910
It is his 15th exhibition.
02:33:07.791 --> 02:33:09.830
Munch uses the occasion to study
02:33:10.111 --> 02:33:13.271
the effect of his paintings
placed next to one another
02:33:13.471 --> 02:33:16.191
in the order of
their developing theme
02:33:16.311 --> 02:33:17.831
for now he is planning
02:33:17.991 --> 02:33:19.351
and working on
02:33:19.471 --> 02:33:23.751
a whole cycle of paintings
that will link together
02:33:23.911 --> 02:33:27.151
a Frieze of Life,
as Munch calls it
02:33:27.271 --> 02:33:29.871
to unfold the very meaning
02:33:30.031 --> 02:33:32.430
of nature and existence.
02:33:33.351 --> 02:33:35.951
It's so calm.
02:33:40.911 --> 02:33:42.391
May I kiss you?
02:33:52.391 --> 02:33:54.670
Munch returns to Berlin.
02:33:55.031 --> 02:33:58.230
The Danish critics echo
the Norwegians and the Germans:
02:33:59.151 --> 02:34:02.231
"Some of the pictures
are shockingly bad."
02:34:02.431 --> 02:34:05.471
"There is little hope that
the artist's talent will develop."
02:34:05.591 --> 02:34:07.631
Do you sleep better now?
02:34:10.231 --> 02:34:13.990
"The disease is almost
certainly incurable."
02:34:35.711 --> 02:34:44.151
The last Sunday Pappa and I
went up Liabrubakken to church
02:34:45.591 --> 02:34:52.471
I remember that I said,
"You're very like Edvard today."
02:34:54.911 --> 02:34:59.151
"Am I?" he replied happily
and straightened himself up.
02:34:59.991 --> 02:35:03.431
Look what I bought from
Helgelandsmoen, Edvard.
02:35:06.830 --> 02:35:10.311
Is it wine? It doesn't look
very good.
02:35:21.671 --> 02:35:26.351
When he comes home at night,
he often starts to paint
02:35:26.990 --> 02:35:32.590
and if you visit him in the morning,
you may trip over a palette
02:35:32.710 --> 02:35:37.510
and a new painting
in some crazy position.
02:35:38.750 --> 02:35:42.791
By the early Spring
Strindberg writes of Dagny Juel:
02:35:43.391 --> 02:35:46.710
"When the spark has leaped
and the currents are neutralised
02:35:46.870 --> 02:35:49.431
"he discovers that she is ugly.
02:35:49.911 --> 02:35:52.791
"When he remembers
how she has offered herself
02:35:52.951 --> 02:35:55.991
"he is overwhelmed
by revulsion for her body."
02:35:56.111 --> 02:36:02.111
Did you know how I suffered?
Did you understand why I was hard?
02:36:03.791 --> 02:36:08.351
I wasn't myself.
She was in me, in my blood.
02:36:11.071 --> 02:36:14.430
Inger promised for all of us
02:36:15.110 --> 02:36:16.951
that we'd be true to God.
02:36:22.191 --> 02:36:25.950
Strindberg first offers Dagny Juel
to the student Lidforss
02:36:26.070 --> 02:36:28.231
who is known to be in love with her.
02:36:28.390 --> 02:36:31.870
But Lidforss tells Strindberg
that he cannot accept.
02:36:32.191 --> 02:36:34.430
He is suffering from syphilis.
02:36:43.390 --> 02:36:46.670
Strindberg then turns to
his next alternative
02:36:46.831 --> 02:36:50.311
Doctor Ludwig Schleich,
a habitué of the Black Pig.
02:36:50.711 --> 02:36:52.990
Schleich accepts.
02:36:53.551 --> 02:36:54.910
A man can't live
02:36:55.071 --> 02:36:58.870
more than three or four years
with the same woman.
02:36:59.311 --> 02:37:04.111
One must make new discoveries.
02:37:04.510 --> 02:37:11.151
By loving one, can't we love
many at the same time?
02:37:11.630 --> 02:37:13.430
You want to be men,
02:37:13.670 --> 02:37:15.030
not human beings.
02:37:15.190 --> 02:37:17.790
One should strive
to be a human being.
02:37:18.750 --> 02:37:22.430
Both men and women
derive strength
02:37:23.191 --> 02:37:25.750
from being united
in front of everyone.
02:37:27.390 --> 02:37:30.071
Women have become
more and more manly.
02:37:30.471 --> 02:37:36.071
They strive for humanity but
in that they see only manliness.
02:37:44.031 --> 02:37:48.390
Has anyone tried to love a woman
who walks like a man,
02:37:49.151 --> 02:37:53.351
talks like a man, moves like a man?
02:37:54.311 --> 02:37:57.670
It's like loving a man
who acts like a woman.
02:37:58.311 --> 02:37:59.431
Disgusting!
02:38:10.710 --> 02:38:13.070
Przybyszewski says of this painting:
02:38:13.391 --> 02:38:15.910
"A man broken in spirit
02:38:16.031 --> 02:38:19.271
"on his neck the face
of a biting vampire."
02:38:19.390 --> 02:38:24.111
"There is something terribly silent,
passionless about this picture.
02:38:38.111 --> 02:38:41.911
"The man spins around and around,
powerless.
02:38:42.390 --> 02:38:47.031
"He cannot rid himself
of that vampire nor of the pain
02:38:47.190 --> 02:38:52.310
"and the woman will always sit there,
will bite eternally."
02:39:02.111 --> 02:39:05.190
In his canvas
Death in the Sickroom
02:39:05.310 --> 02:39:10.150
contrasted to the detailed, staring
face of his younger sister Inger
02:39:10.670 --> 02:39:12.231
Munch depicts himself
02:39:12.391 --> 02:39:18.271
turned away, in profile,
his face a blank mask.
02:39:18.551 --> 02:39:22.830
He was very happy that Edvard
had received the scholarship.
02:39:23.870 --> 02:39:29.470
But he was sorry he had forgotten
to send Edvard's Bible.
02:39:31.991 --> 02:39:35.230
I've written to Edvard
to say he must buy one.
02:39:37.471 --> 02:39:39.030
At this period
02:39:39.190 --> 02:39:43.310
as he paints Mrs Heiberg
standing outside her summer cottage
02:39:43.430 --> 02:39:45.870
her shadow looming large
02:39:45.991 --> 02:39:50.990
the psychic and sexual tension of
Edvard Munch is at an unbearable peak.
02:39:51.471 --> 02:39:54.030
Constantly his nerves
are at breaking point
02:39:54.191 --> 02:39:57.030
as he struggles to find
the artistic solution
02:39:57.190 --> 02:39:59.110
to expressing his feelings.
02:40:00.791 --> 02:40:05.711
He is isolated from his family,
separated for ever from his father.
02:40:05.830 --> 02:40:08.990
His work is rejected
in his own country.
02:40:09.110 --> 02:40:13.951
He watches his mistress, Dagny Juel,
pass from one hand to another.
02:40:14.270 --> 02:40:19.031
His bronchial condition is worsening.
He is drinking heavily.
02:40:19.591 --> 02:40:23.790
It's far too dangerous
to share a woman with another man.
02:40:23.991 --> 02:40:31.190
If a man mounts a woman
who has just been with another man,
02:40:31.511 --> 02:40:37.790
the preceding man's sperm will enter
the organ of the man now mounting her.
02:40:40.350 --> 02:40:45.231
He believes that he is going insane,
that he is about to die.
02:41:13.790 --> 02:41:16.430
The affair between Dagny Juel
and Ludwig Schleich
02:41:16.750 --> 02:41:20.191
lasts, again, for only two weeks.
02:41:20.710 --> 02:41:24.830
Strindberg then agrees to help
Schleich pass Dagny on to another man
02:41:24.950 --> 02:41:28.790
and now offers her
to Stanislaw Przybyszewski.
02:41:28.950 --> 02:41:31.711
Strindberg himself is in good spirits
at this time.
02:41:31.830 --> 02:41:34.390
He is about to leave Berlin
for his marriage.
02:41:34.670 --> 02:41:36.791
He declares himself to be in love
02:41:36.910 --> 02:41:40.150
and glad to be rid of
the "wretched woman DJ."
02:41:53.230 --> 02:41:57.270
You're disfiguring yourself!
You'll die. Ugly and stinking.
02:41:58.550 --> 02:42:02.390
And I, I shall drink wine
with exultant women.
02:42:03.030 --> 02:42:04.270
I shall laugh
02:42:04.870 --> 02:42:06.431
even more!
02:42:11.190 --> 02:42:15.710
At this time in Berlin,
a party is held in "The Black Pig."
02:42:16.470 --> 02:42:22.950
Accompanied by the sound of the sea
Oda Krohg and an ex-lover of Strindberg
02:42:23.110 --> 02:42:28.390
dance in the centre of the room
with crab-tails placed in their hair.
02:42:57.070 --> 02:43:02.350
With Sigbjørn Obstfelder,
Edvard Munch briefly visits Kristiania.
02:43:03.190 --> 02:43:05.710
At the same time, in Berlin
02:43:05.790 --> 02:43:10.310
Dagny Juel is marrying
Stanislaw Przybyszewski.
02:43:25.190 --> 02:43:28.510
This can't go on.
I can't put up with any more.
02:43:33.511 --> 02:43:37.110
Emotions. I can't have emotions.
02:43:40.390 --> 02:43:45.630
I wait and then she comes
and simply walks past with a smile.
02:43:56.430 --> 02:44:00.030
"I look. I look at the white sky.
02:44:00.190 --> 02:44:04.950
"I look at the Grey-blue clouds.
I look at the bloody sun.
02:44:05.990 --> 02:44:10.271
"So this is the world.
This is the home of the planets.
02:44:11.030 --> 02:44:12.630
"A drop of rain.
02:44:12.870 --> 02:44:15.390
"I look at the high buildings.
02:44:15.510 --> 02:44:19.910
"I look at the thousand windows,
at the distant church spire.
02:44:20.390 --> 02:44:24.470
"So this is the world.
So this is the home of mankind.
02:44:25.070 --> 02:44:28.750
"The Grey-blue clouds gather.
The sun disappears.
02:44:29.270 --> 02:44:32.750
"I look at well-dressed gentlemen.
I look at smiling ladies.
02:44:32.990 --> 02:44:38.030
"I look at leaning horses
and the Grey-blue clouds grow heavy.
02:44:38.710 --> 02:44:40.910
"I look. I look.
02:44:41.430 --> 02:44:45.590
"I must have come to the wrong globe.
Everything is so strange."
02:44:48.710 --> 02:44:54.190
In late 1893, using pastel
on a base of cardboard
02:44:54.350 --> 02:44:57.830
Edvard Munch creates The Shriek.
02:45:01.230 --> 02:45:05.950
December 1893. A gallery on
the Unter den Linden in Berlin.
02:45:06.270 --> 02:45:09.390
Edvard Munch's 24th exhibition.
02:45:09.750 --> 02:45:13.230
Amongst the works exhibited
are 5 of his Life Frieze
02:45:13.390 --> 02:45:16.110
listed in the catalogue
under the title
02:45:16.230 --> 02:45:19.190
Studies for a Series on Love.
02:45:19.750 --> 02:45:23.790
I placed the paintings together
and it was as though
02:45:23.990 --> 02:45:26.550
each was connected to the others.
02:45:27.990 --> 02:45:35.350
Then came a tone, a musical tone,
linking the pictures together.
02:45:38.590 --> 02:45:44.550
So, if a relationship between
two people is to be sound
02:45:44.710 --> 02:45:46.510
and I think it can be so
02:45:46.750 --> 02:45:48.550
even if not for ever,
02:45:50.790 --> 02:45:53.990
it must be based on mutual regard,
02:45:56.430 --> 02:45:58.150
on tolerance.
02:46:02.790 --> 02:46:07.950
In the wards of Oscar Kokoschka,
the Austrian Expressionist painter
02:46:09.190 --> 02:46:13.790
"It was given to Edvard Munch's
deeply probing mind
02:46:13.910 --> 02:46:16.990
"to diagnose 'panic dread'
02:46:17.110 --> 02:46:20.430
"in what was apparently
social progress."
02:46:28.470 --> 02:46:31.830
One member of the public
writes in his catalogue
02:46:32.070 --> 02:46:36.430
that the exhibition is
"the world's greatest swindle.
02:46:37.030 --> 02:46:41.870
"Junk! Take it all
to the insane asylum!"
02:46:44.429 --> 02:46:47.030
And Munch himself has written
02:46:47.190 --> 02:46:51.470
in pencil in the red sky
of The Shriek
02:46:52.670 --> 02:46:56.390
"Could only have been painted
by a madman."
02:47:06.950 --> 02:47:08.790
1894.
02:47:09.190 --> 02:47:12.110
A canvas entitled Anxiety.
02:47:13.229 --> 02:47:14.950
The faces of Edvard Munch
02:47:15.270 --> 02:47:19.150
Stanislaw Przybyszewski
and Dagny Juel.
02:47:19.870 --> 02:47:21.869
Here, as in "The Shriek"
02:47:21.990 --> 02:47:26.830
the individual is in the grip of
something far beyond his control.
02:47:57.910 --> 02:48:02.030
I have a friend who got married.
02:48:02.230 --> 02:48:05.190
After two months he was a mess!
02:48:05.510 --> 02:48:06.550
As if his wife
02:48:06.830 --> 02:48:08.830
had drawn his teeth.
02:48:09.189 --> 02:48:11.070
And his wife, then?
02:48:11.270 --> 02:48:13.830
She was a dreadful bitch!
02:48:14.269 --> 02:48:15.510
That's what she was!
02:48:15.629 --> 02:48:17.350
Wasn't she disappointed?
02:48:17.950 --> 02:48:22.470
She took everything from him.
She treated him like a dog.
02:48:23.070 --> 02:48:26.350
She said come and he came.
She said go
02:48:26.590 --> 02:48:27.830
and he wanted to go.
02:48:27.910 --> 02:48:31.549
We had to pull him out
of her embrace
02:48:31.790 --> 02:48:34.070
from between her breasts.
02:48:36.270 --> 02:48:40.150
His eyes were quite ashen.
They were empty!
02:48:40.950 --> 02:48:42.950
She was a dreadful bitch!
02:48:50.030 --> 02:48:52.230
Munch has now completed
another three canvases:
02:48:54.029 --> 02:48:57.350
a woman pressed into
the embrace of Death
02:48:58.110 --> 02:49:01.989
the gaunt face of Przybyszewski
above his skeleton arm
02:49:02.750 --> 02:49:05.350
and Dagny Juel, poised...
02:49:06.230 --> 02:49:07.910
inviting.
02:49:29.910 --> 02:49:32.350
You talk about your friend.
02:49:34.430 --> 02:49:41.909
How do you think his wife felt
after an unsuccessful relationship?
02:49:42.390 --> 02:49:47.230
Has she emerged from it proudly,
undamaged? Is she not marked?
02:49:47.389 --> 02:49:48.990
She is thriving.
02:49:55.390 --> 02:50:00.230
Przybyszewski has himself
published a short novel in which
02:50:00.670 --> 02:50:03.709
the hero gives his wife to an artist
02:50:03.870 --> 02:50:07.470
and luxuriates in the feelings
of hate and jealousy
02:50:07.790 --> 02:50:10.110
that he has aroused in himself.
02:50:20.390 --> 02:50:27.790
English doctors have proved that,
if two children lie together,
02:50:27.910 --> 02:50:33.349
the weaker will absorb strength
from the stronger.
02:50:35.150 --> 02:50:38.630
Which of them loses by it?
In bed, I mean.
02:50:39.629 --> 02:50:40.950
The stronger.
02:50:41.429 --> 02:50:42.550
And the male is
02:50:42.750 --> 02:50:44.309
the one who is stronger?
02:50:46.070 --> 02:50:46.909
Yes.
02:51:00.790 --> 02:51:05.870
August Strindberg describes Munch's
canvas The Kiss as
02:51:07.390 --> 02:51:09.910
"the fusion of two beings
02:51:09.990 --> 02:51:13.789
"the smaller of which,
shaped like a carp
02:51:13.949 --> 02:51:16.990
"seems on the point
of devouring the larger
02:51:17.109 --> 02:51:19.029
"as is the habit of vermin
02:51:19.310 --> 02:51:22.950
"microbes, vampires
and women."
02:51:33.870 --> 02:51:37.590
Who did he get those ideas from?
02:51:39.510 --> 02:51:42.989
Why does he see things like that?
02:51:43.590 --> 02:51:45.629
I don't understand.
02:51:45.990 --> 02:51:49.390
If you love a woman
and she loves you
02:51:49.989 --> 02:51:52.629
it's a reciprocal relationship.
02:51:52.990 --> 02:51:57.630
The tension which passes
from one to the other
02:51:57.990 --> 02:52:01.910
also goes in the opposite direction.
02:52:02.590 --> 02:52:05.069
I can't understand him.
02:52:06.430 --> 02:52:08.269
But the future...
02:52:09.670 --> 02:52:12.909
Must there be a struggle
between the sexes?
02:52:14.070 --> 02:52:17.869
Must it be man against woman,
woman against man?
02:52:20.029 --> 02:52:24.910
Since our souls were saved
together for Jesus' sake,
02:52:25.669 --> 02:52:28.870
God be with you, Sophie,
02:52:29.470 --> 02:52:32.630
little pale Edvard, Andreas
02:52:32.830 --> 02:52:34.149
and Inger
02:52:35.070 --> 02:52:40.310
and you, my kind, dear, unforgettable
self-sacrificing husband.
02:52:44.550 --> 02:52:51.749
I have also written something
to Edvard, my eldest son.
02:52:55.149 --> 02:52:59.470
"Do not covet that
which is on earth,
02:52:59.990 --> 02:53:02.309
"but rather that
which is in heaven.
02:53:03.190 --> 02:53:04.950
"Keep watch and pray.
02:53:06.990 --> 02:53:08.550
"Your mother."
02:53:23.789 --> 02:53:26.949
Munch creates yet another version
of Melancholy.
02:53:28.310 --> 02:53:32.790
"Blank against the twisting,
sinuous shore of Åsgårdstrand.
02:53:33.389 --> 02:53:37.669
"two rocks, like the black eyes
of a snake
02:53:37.910 --> 02:53:39.709
"stare at him."
02:53:48.590 --> 02:53:50.309
I can't go on.
02:53:55.870 --> 02:53:58.870
A predominant characteristic
of Munch's work in this period
02:53:59.030 --> 02:54:03.390
is the lack of contact between
the human beings in his paintings.
02:54:03.709 --> 02:54:05.389
People remain isolated
02:54:05.669 --> 02:54:08.789
even though in direct
physical contact.
02:54:09.150 --> 02:54:11.789
The sensory organs disappear
02:54:11.870 --> 02:54:13.749
faces become blank
02:54:13.869 --> 02:54:17.350
hands are clubs or curved hooks
02:54:17.670 --> 02:54:21.070
as the features of human contact
are eliminated.
02:54:22.150 --> 02:54:23.990
For Edvard Munch himself
02:54:24.110 --> 02:54:27.189
human contact
is becoming a matter of fear
02:54:27.349 --> 02:54:31.110
fear of his own ego
dissolving into the psyche
02:54:31.189 --> 02:54:33.389
and into the body of another.
02:54:50.030 --> 02:54:57.150
Colours, brushwork
and lines express so much.
02:54:58.670 --> 02:55:04.909
They're fantastic.
No artist can compete with him.
02:55:07.229 --> 02:55:11.509
To be honest, I don't like
these paintings at all.
02:55:11.710 --> 02:55:15.909
I'm no art expert
but they don't say anything to me.
02:55:16.109 --> 02:55:18.589
I don't like his art at all.
02:55:18.989 --> 02:55:25.989
So unnatural, the colours are
not natural: blue trees...
02:55:26.989 --> 02:55:29.230
I don't like it.
02:55:29.749 --> 02:55:33.790
His figures are
no more than suggested.
02:55:35.309 --> 02:55:38.749
Munch makes
a powerful impression on me.
02:55:38.990 --> 02:55:43.149
He reflects a great deal
of humanity in his paintings
02:55:44.269 --> 02:55:48.749
and shows brutal reality,
02:55:48.990 --> 02:55:50.829
as life is.
02:55:51.829 --> 02:55:57.829
I'm a compatriot of Munch
and I've heard it said of him
02:55:58.470 --> 02:56:02.629
that he's an awful,
dreadful man. But I like it.
02:56:02.830 --> 02:56:06.950
He says something
about human beings
02:56:07.110 --> 02:56:09.030
and he speaks to me.
02:56:10.309 --> 02:56:15.829
I know a little about the situation.
I feel that he speaks the truth.
02:56:17.549 --> 02:56:20.390
This is how I really believe it is.
02:56:44.390 --> 02:56:48.829
Working in hotel bedrooms,
on park and railway station benches
02:56:48.950 --> 02:56:50.990
in bars and restaurants
02:56:51.149 --> 02:56:54.469
using the small piece of copper
which he carries in his pocket
02:56:54.749 --> 02:56:57.789
Edvard Munch begins
his first engraving
02:56:57.949 --> 02:57:01.349
the theme which he captured
the prior year on his canvas
02:57:01.670 --> 02:57:03.709
Death And The Maiden.
02:57:03.829 --> 02:57:07.069
A naked woman,
stretched on tip-toe
02:57:07.190 --> 02:57:11.069
presses her full body
into the embrace of Death.
02:57:19.429 --> 02:57:21.830
Towards the end of the 19th century
02:57:21.990 --> 02:57:25.229
a new interest has developed
in the medium of the graphic.
02:57:25.389 --> 02:57:27.269
In Germany, Munch
02:57:27.389 --> 02:57:31.269
here in the company of a professor
of graphic art at Berlin University
02:57:31.389 --> 02:57:34.750
studies the latest trends
in copper engraving.
02:57:34.870 --> 02:57:37.989
In particular, the widely
published etchings
02:57:38.109 --> 02:57:40.309
of the German Max Klinger.
02:57:41.069 --> 02:57:46.789
Here his cycle of eight developing
studies entitled "Eine Liebe" -
02:57:46.909 --> 02:57:48.310
A Love.
02:57:50.189 --> 02:57:52.269
The technical brilliance
of Klinger's work
02:57:52.389 --> 02:57:57.349
its painstakingly studied detail,
its use of black and white masses
02:57:57.469 --> 02:58:00.349
its fashionable though
superficially treated themes
02:58:00.469 --> 02:58:04.309
of eroticism and despair,
intrigue Munch
02:58:04.469 --> 02:58:08.190
and reinforces his desire
to treat a similar cycle
02:58:08.350 --> 02:58:11.989
on afar deeper
and more expressive level.
02:58:16.830 --> 02:58:18.709
I met a young woman
02:58:20.069 --> 02:58:22.109
on the street one evening.
02:58:22.549 --> 02:58:24.629
Her eyes attracted me.
02:58:25.149 --> 02:58:27.389
They were large childish eyes.
02:58:28.189 --> 02:58:32.829
I looked at her. She turned
and we walked together.
02:58:34.629 --> 02:58:37.469
"Do you want to come up?" I said.
02:58:38.749 --> 02:58:42.589
In my room she seemed
a little shabbily dressed.
02:58:42.989 --> 02:58:47.349
Her face was a little harrowed
but her eyes
02:58:47.549 --> 02:58:49.189
were beautiful.
02:58:49.789 --> 02:58:51.589
"Why did you come with me?" I said.
02:58:52.989 --> 02:58:55.189
"That's why I walk the streets."
02:59:09.989 --> 02:59:15.069
Munch writes in his diary:
"Ill, ill and lonely.
02:59:16.029 --> 02:59:17.669
"He wanted to put his tired head
02:59:17.989 --> 02:59:19.790
"on a soft lady's breast
02:59:21.389 --> 02:59:25.029
"smell her perfume,
hear her heartbeat.
02:59:25.389 --> 02:59:29.349
"Feel her soft curved breasts
to his cheek.
02:59:29.670 --> 02:59:32.709
"And, when he looked up,
meet her look above him
02:59:33.189 --> 02:59:38.069
"and then he would close his eyes
and feel her warm deep look
02:59:38.189 --> 02:59:41.029
"and her soft, lustful smile.
02:59:41.870 --> 02:59:45.829
"And then she would stroke
his hair softly downwards...
02:59:47.109 --> 02:59:48.749
"downwards..."
03:00:18.989 --> 03:00:21.869
In Munch's diaries
appear these words:
03:00:22.469 --> 03:00:24.229
"I greeted.
03:00:24.349 --> 03:00:26.829
"The girlfriend laughed a little.
03:00:26.989 --> 03:00:29.429
"The pale one smiled a bit, too.
03:00:29.750 --> 03:00:32.469
"May I introduce myself? Painter.
03:00:32.789 --> 03:00:35.869
"I take the liberty...
I want to paint you.
03:00:36.989 --> 03:00:40.669
"I bought half a bottle of port
and went to the studio with them."
03:00:49.829 --> 03:00:51.789
"Then you'll come tomorrow?"
03:00:52.749 --> 03:00:53.909
Yes.
03:00:55.390 --> 03:00:57.149
She hid the flowers.
03:00:57.349 --> 03:01:00.470
Neither her sister
or father had noticed.
03:01:01.549 --> 03:01:03.829
They would have laughed.
03:01:05.909 --> 03:01:08.549
He thought of her all day.
03:01:10.189 --> 03:01:12.149
She looked tired.
03:01:13.229 --> 03:01:14.829
But she was kind.
03:01:15.909 --> 03:01:17.189
Was it true?
03:01:33.909 --> 03:01:35.030
"They stopped.
03:01:35.429 --> 03:01:39.389
"Brandt looked at the large house
sombre-looking between the trees.
03:01:40.109 --> 03:01:42.349
"The maids had gone to bed.
03:01:42.469 --> 03:01:45.029
"Then it was as if he was supposed
to say something
03:01:45.189 --> 03:01:47.309
"but was unable to find the words.
03:01:48.189 --> 03:01:51.069
"'I have to go,' she said slowly.
03:01:51.709 --> 03:01:55.149
"He put out his hand
and took hers without shaking it.
03:01:56.349 --> 03:01:59.229
"'Goodbye then,' he said and left."
03:02:31.189 --> 03:02:33.389
"She was a swan.
03:02:33.709 --> 03:02:37.389
"I lived down in the water
among slime and horrible animals
03:02:38.989 --> 03:02:41.749
"remembered a time
when I lived up there.
03:02:42.029 --> 03:02:45.389
"I forced myself up,
reached for the swan.
03:02:46.029 --> 03:02:47.749
"Couldn't reach it.
03:02:47.989 --> 03:02:51.309
"I saw my face, terribly pale.
03:02:51.469 --> 03:02:56.189
"I heard a shriek and I knew
it was I who had cried.
03:02:57.349 --> 03:03:00.389
"The swan was far away."
03:03:16.789 --> 03:03:21.789
During the two years of 1893
and 1894, sometimes alone
03:03:21.989 --> 03:03:25.708
sometimes with the help of
Adolf Paul, biographer of Strindberg
03:03:25.829 --> 03:03:29.989
Edvard Munch lists, labels,
checks, crates and dispatches
03:03:30.109 --> 03:03:32.909
upwards of 50 or 60 canvases
03:03:33.069 --> 03:03:36.829
to each of nearly
a dozen major exhibitions:
03:03:36.989 --> 03:03:41.109
Dresden, Breslau, Hamburg,
Berlin, Frankfurt.
03:03:41.389 --> 03:03:44.669
He travels hundreds of miles
by train.
03:03:44.989 --> 03:03:49.549
Sorrow... Sunset...
03:03:49.988 --> 03:03:52.669
Countless hotel bedrooms
03:03:52.789 --> 03:03:56.909
often working on three or four
canvases simultaneously
03:03:57.309 --> 03:03:59.789
and always under attack.
03:04:57.029 --> 03:05:00.669
In July 1894, at the age of 31
03:05:01.229 --> 03:05:05.669
having painted for 14 years,
created some 80 canvases
03:05:06.149 --> 03:05:08.349
organised 30 exhibitions
03:05:08.708 --> 03:05:13.389
Edvard Munch receives his first
serious recognition as an artist
03:05:13.989 --> 03:05:17.068
500 miles from his own homeland.
03:05:17.789 --> 03:05:20.228
The publication in Berlin
of four essays
03:05:20.869 --> 03:05:24.109
by the influential art-critic
Julius Meier-Graefe
03:05:24.269 --> 03:05:25.669
Stanislaw Przybyszewski
03:05:26.309 --> 03:05:27.989
and two other German critics.
03:05:30.709 --> 03:05:33.429
The first evaluation
of Edvard Munch's art
03:05:33.789 --> 03:05:36.669
and its importance
for the contemporary age.
03:05:39.909 --> 03:05:42.749
Constantly seeking other forms
of graphic art
03:05:43.069 --> 03:05:45.949
Munch moves to etching and aquatint
03:05:46.069 --> 03:05:48.869
the use of acid to bite the image
03:05:48.989 --> 03:05:53.069
and a base of cooked resin powder
to give added texture.
03:05:53.309 --> 03:05:56.949
His theme, a man comforting
a crying woman.
03:05:59.909 --> 03:06:03.349
What would I not give
if only I could once
03:06:03.549 --> 03:06:08.788
put my arms about him and
tell him how fond of him I am.
03:06:09.509 --> 03:06:12.389
Shyness always came between us.
03:06:13.988 --> 03:06:16.389
At this time, Strindberg is in Paris
03:06:17.189 --> 03:06:21.388
already separated from his wife,
living in the utmost poverty
03:06:21.668 --> 03:06:26.909
engaged in chemical experiments
trying to make gold from copper
03:06:27.028 --> 03:06:30.749
about to begin the writing
of his short story Inferno
03:06:31.189 --> 03:06:34.789
an autobiographical study
of psychological collapse.
03:06:35.149 --> 03:06:41.189
He had a stroke on Monday evening
and died three days later.
03:06:44.069 --> 03:06:46.829
The book written by Meier-Graefe,
03:06:47.509 --> 03:06:51.669
Przybyszewski and
the two other critics
03:06:52.429 --> 03:06:55.189
becomes a milestone
03:06:56.149 --> 03:07:00.309
in understanding
Edvard Munch's work.
03:07:01.708 --> 03:07:07.549
A paraphrase of a line by Goethe
03:07:08.389 --> 03:07:13.788
provides the best formula
03:07:13.909 --> 03:07:18.229
for the impression
which it radiates:
03:07:18.429 --> 03:07:21.429
"Here and now
03:07:21.628 --> 03:07:29.229
"a new phase begins
in the history of art
03:07:29.509 --> 03:07:33.668
"and you can say
that you witnessed it."
03:07:42.149 --> 03:07:44.149
1894.
03:07:44.388 --> 03:07:47.149
President Carnot of France
assassinated.
03:07:48.309 --> 03:07:51.069
Alfred Dreyfus arrested.
03:07:51.788 --> 03:07:55.429
In Sicily, food riots,
martial law
03:07:55.989 --> 03:07:58.949
suppression of the Italian
socialist parties.
03:07:59.308 --> 03:08:02.789
Japan declares war on China.
03:08:09.549 --> 03:08:12.429
"How dark it grew at once.
03:08:12.829 --> 03:08:15.749
"How vast and black the sky grew.
03:08:16.748 --> 03:08:21.388
"Endless, listening,
the stillness of death.
03:08:21.909 --> 03:08:27.468
"Close, close and far, far away.
03:08:29.469 --> 03:08:33.068
"How dark it grew.
Stay with me tonight.
03:08:33.509 --> 03:08:36.829
"My soul is frightened and anxious.
03:08:37.669 --> 03:08:38.789
"The dark holds
03:08:38.909 --> 03:08:40.789
"such strange shadows
03:08:41.548 --> 03:08:44.748
"and the stillness
such strange tones.
03:08:46.309 --> 03:08:52.189
"My friends leave and I sit alone,
deep into the night.
03:08:54.549 --> 03:08:57.549
"What grows bright
over the mountains?
03:08:57.989 --> 03:09:02.028
"What glows over the sea?
What glints in the dark?
03:09:02.389 --> 03:09:04.468
"What burns in the wind?
03:09:06.148 --> 03:09:08.669
"Not clouds against the red sky.
03:09:08.868 --> 03:09:12.028
"Not the reflected light
of a dead day.
03:09:12.428 --> 03:09:16.229
"It is fire which licks
and blood which runs
03:09:16.668 --> 03:09:19.828
"A fiery sword and a fire-red river.
03:09:20.268 --> 03:09:24.388
"It is the anguish of doomsday
and the torments of death.
03:09:24.748 --> 03:09:28.669
"A scripture which blazes
through the halls of night.
03:09:29.028 --> 03:09:32.109
"With the mysterious anguish of life.
03:09:34.469 --> 03:09:37.709
"Deep in the night I sat alone.
03:09:38.468 --> 03:09:42.908
"I felt how a pain-filled scream
03:09:43.189 --> 03:09:46.828
"passed over the
Godforsaken world."
03:09:54.268 --> 03:09:56.389
October 1894.
03:09:56.669 --> 03:10:01.349
The first exposure of Munch's work
in Sweden, the land of Strindberg.
03:10:01.668 --> 03:10:04.148
With one exception,
the critics are merciless
03:10:04.268 --> 03:10:06.908
even discovering points of similarity
03:10:07.028 --> 03:10:10.909
in the erotomaniac drawings
of the mentally deranged.
03:10:15.429 --> 03:10:18.148
Edvard Munch returns to Berlin.
03:10:18.709 --> 03:10:22.948
The Swedish Academy officially
repudiates Munch's work, stating
03:10:23.188 --> 03:10:27.188
that the Academy allies itself
with "the verdict of rejection
03:10:27.348 --> 03:10:31.349
"of which Edvard Munch has become
the object on the continent."
03:10:32.629 --> 03:10:38.868
All the others, some with faces
red from tears and others white,
03:10:39.749 --> 03:10:43.949
rang in Christmas,
while outside the bells tolled.
03:10:45.629 --> 03:10:49.388
In the other room stood
the Christmas tree,
03:10:49.589 --> 03:10:52.349
so gay and so sad.
03:10:52.988 --> 03:10:54.429
Jesus, help me.
03:10:55.389 --> 03:10:57.709
Will I go to heaven if I die?
03:10:58.828 --> 03:11:02.428
I think so, my boy,
if you have faith.
03:11:04.908 --> 03:11:08.028
Much of the tension in Edvard Munch
during these years
03:11:08.868 --> 03:11:12.188
is his search for a "knot"
to tie together
03:11:12.349 --> 03:11:15.148
the disparate themes
of his Life Frieze
03:11:15.909 --> 03:11:18.868
to explain and clarify
and unite them.
03:11:19.148 --> 03:11:21.989
Now, a theme emerges.
03:11:22.789 --> 03:11:26.389
The triple aspect of Munch's
feelings for Woman:
03:11:27.148 --> 03:11:29.828
the Temptress, the Devourer
03:11:29.988 --> 03:11:32.789
for whom he has both a revulsion
and a deep longing
03:11:35.669 --> 03:11:37.388
the Virgin, the Innocent
03:11:37.708 --> 03:11:39.988
for whom he has respect
03:11:40.708 --> 03:11:44.388
the Giver of Life, the Mother,
the Sacrifice
03:11:44.749 --> 03:11:46.988
for whom he has compassion.
03:11:48.108 --> 03:11:48.989
The complexity
03:11:49.109 --> 03:11:52.149
of Munch's suffering, of his art
03:11:52.388 --> 03:11:56.468
is that each of these three images,
for him...
03:11:57.909 --> 03:12:00.748
are one and the same woman.
03:12:04.988 --> 03:12:07.349
April 19, 1895.
03:12:08.268 --> 03:12:12.348
Munch's younger brother Peter Andreas
marries Johanne Kinck
03:12:12.429 --> 03:12:15.828
age 22, daughter of a headmaster
03:12:15.989 --> 03:12:20.829
with, it is said,
the mental age of a girl of 12.
03:12:21.109 --> 03:12:25.069
Munch writes: "He should not
have gone through with it.
03:12:25.228 --> 03:12:29.068
"From father's side of the family
we inherited poor nerves.
03:12:29.309 --> 03:12:32.668
"Then there was mother's
lung weakness..."
03:12:40.228 --> 03:12:42.189
The year 1895.
03:12:42.349 --> 03:12:45.708
H. G. Wells writes
The Time Machine.
03:12:45.828 --> 03:12:49.108
Sigmund Freud founds
psychoanalysis.
03:12:49.469 --> 03:12:52.148
Italian troops advance into Ethiopia.
03:12:52.909 --> 03:12:56.189
And Edvard Munch creates
a new lithograph
03:12:56.349 --> 03:12:59.749
Self-portrait with Skeleton Arm.
03:13:07.149 --> 03:13:13.189
"Then I thanked her shortly
and accompanied her to the gate.
03:13:14.068 --> 03:13:19.188
- "'Won't you come inside?'
- 'No, thanks, it's getting late. '
03:13:20.148 --> 03:13:23.188
"She looked a little bit
disappointed, I thought.
03:13:24.189 --> 03:13:28.188
"I went home quickly,
rather satisfied with myself.
03:13:29.068 --> 03:13:32.068
"I felt I had got a small revenge."
03:13:35.748 --> 03:13:37.988
"A lady dressed in black.
03:13:38.388 --> 03:13:41.268
"He quickly walked up
the street after her.
03:13:41.388 --> 03:13:46.109
"He started to run, ran like mad,
pushing people away.
03:13:46.669 --> 03:13:51.388
"He stopped, short of breath.
He was ashamed, running like that.
03:13:51.668 --> 03:13:54.308
"Fool. It wasn't her after all."
03:13:57.988 --> 03:14:00.828
"At times the blood ran
down the sheets.
03:14:01.469 --> 03:14:04.909
"His father was on his knees
in front of the bed praying.
03:14:05.029 --> 03:14:09.068
"His hands stretched upward.
His voice husky from crying.
03:14:09.388 --> 03:14:12.268
"'Lord, I beg you.
I demand from you.
03:14:12.388 --> 03:14:15.228
"'Don't let him die today.
He is not prepared.
03:14:15.388 --> 03:14:18.349
"'I beg you, have mercy on us.
Let him live.
03:14:18.469 --> 03:14:22.108
"'He will always serve you.
He has promised me that. '"
03:14:35.509 --> 03:14:38.348
Can't you stay?
It's so lovely here.
03:14:39.069 --> 03:14:42.428
- No, I can't.
- Don't you want to?
03:14:44.068 --> 03:14:45.348
No.
03:14:47.188 --> 03:14:50.348
How strange you are.
Not like others.
03:14:54.468 --> 03:14:57.508
He slept little that night.
His lips burned.
03:14:59.548 --> 03:15:04.188
He pressed his hand against them.
He was back amongst the trees.
03:15:05.428 --> 03:15:06.468
He felt again
03:15:06.748 --> 03:15:08.788
how she gave way,
03:15:09.148 --> 03:15:12.508
how everything disappeared
03:15:13.148 --> 03:15:16.068
and the tickling
softness against his mouth.
03:15:41.428 --> 03:15:43.868
How often have you sat at home
03:15:44.468 --> 03:15:48.428
and waited for your wife,
listened for every step?
03:15:50.948 --> 03:15:55.468
She said she was going
to meet a woman friend...
03:15:55.628 --> 03:15:57.988
a woman friend she seldom met.
03:16:00.188 --> 03:16:02.668
October 1895.
03:16:02.989 --> 03:16:05.869
The Blomqvist gallery in Kristiania.
03:16:06.429 --> 03:16:11.268
Munch exhibits 40 works.
Amongst them, The Life Frieze.
03:16:11.388 --> 03:16:14.109
The exhibition is heavily attacked.
03:16:14.228 --> 03:16:19.228
The newspaper Morgenbladet states:
"so much nonsense and ugliness...
03:16:19.388 --> 03:16:23.868
"dreadful... low and repulsive...
grimacing and confused...
03:16:23.989 --> 03:16:26.788
"crude and shrieking hideousness."
03:16:27.188 --> 03:16:28.908
The newspaper Aftenposten
03:16:29.068 --> 03:16:31.068
attacks The Life Frieze as being
03:16:31.348 --> 03:16:36.788
"a number of sensual fantasies,
the hallucinations of a sick mind."
03:16:37.188 --> 03:16:42.108
A boycott of the building is called for
and the police are summoned.
03:16:43.068 --> 03:16:44.228
This is amongst
03:16:44.388 --> 03:16:48.228
the worst I've seen.
I don't understand any of it.
03:16:48.389 --> 03:16:49.828
The colours are so ugly.
03:16:50.388 --> 03:16:52.908
Besides, it's highly immoral.
03:16:53.228 --> 03:16:58.708
One almost has to sneak in
by the backdoor.
03:16:59.268 --> 03:17:04.668
How can a young man who looks
so nice create things like this?
03:17:05.068 --> 03:17:10.228
One can't take one's family along
and enjoy the art.
03:17:10.708 --> 03:17:16.348
I don't advocate censorship
but why should this be exhibited?
03:17:16.468 --> 03:17:18.268
Children might see them.
03:17:20.748 --> 03:17:23.748
Edvard Munch returns to Berlin.
03:17:24.508 --> 03:17:32.668
Abroad people will wonder
what sort of morals we have.
03:17:32.948 --> 03:17:34.588
It's not just ugly.
03:17:35.588 --> 03:17:37.548
He paints such unpleasant things
03:17:37.668 --> 03:17:41.588
that one doesn't speak of,
at least my husband and me.
03:17:42.108 --> 03:17:46.549
I regard this as something
which must come to an end.
03:17:49.748 --> 03:17:52.708
In late November,
Peter Andreas Munch
03:17:52.828 --> 03:17:56.388
now married for six months,
writes to his family
03:17:56.868 --> 03:17:59.668
"I can't stand life anymore..."
03:18:00.828 --> 03:18:03.348
and 3 weeks later is dead.
03:18:09.948 --> 03:18:13.028
Many of Munch's contemporaries
now rally to his support
03:18:13.188 --> 03:18:15.349
realising that his art
is probing into
03:18:15.468 --> 03:18:19.388
a new and revolutionary
understanding of the human psyche.
03:18:19.588 --> 03:18:24.348
Munch seeks peculiarity,
mystery in everything he sees.
03:18:25.028 --> 03:18:30.148
He sees the world in wave-lines,
trees, shorelines,
03:18:30.628 --> 03:18:32.988
female hair, trembling bodies.
03:18:34.428 --> 03:18:36.828
Like no other Norwegian painter,
03:18:37.108 --> 03:18:41.548
Munch aims at making
our innermost tremble.
03:18:46.748 --> 03:18:49.428
Working on the theme
of the staring, isolated faces
03:18:49.748 --> 03:18:52.388
in his oil on canvas Anxiety
03:18:52.668 --> 03:18:56.748
Munch now turns to the final of the
graphic arts that he is to conquer:
03:18:57.148 --> 03:18:58.428
woodcut.
03:18:58.748 --> 03:19:01.468
Already he has seen the use
made by Paul Gauguin
03:19:01.748 --> 03:19:04.188
of the grain and texture in wood
03:19:04.988 --> 03:19:07.868
the stark and simple
outlines of the blocks
03:19:08.028 --> 03:19:09.748
cut in Tahiti.
03:19:13.028 --> 03:19:14.388
The Japanese use
03:19:14.748 --> 03:19:17.268
of differently coloured
contours of wood.
03:19:17.748 --> 03:19:19.948
The instant impact in the use
03:19:20.108 --> 03:19:21.988
of primary white and black
03:19:22.188 --> 03:19:24.748
by the Frenchman Paul Valloton.
03:19:28.868 --> 03:19:32.748
In this field Munch perhaps
surpasses all his other work.
03:19:32.988 --> 03:19:36.228
He invents a method of
cutting out individual pieces of wood
03:19:36.348 --> 03:19:39.108
shaped to various contours
in the picture
03:19:39.348 --> 03:19:41.788
inking the pieces
in their different colours
03:19:41.948 --> 03:19:43.788
and then fitting them
back together again
03:19:43.868 --> 03:19:46.428
like a jigsaw, ready for printing.
03:19:46.908 --> 03:19:48.948
He uses the grain in the wood
03:19:49.068 --> 03:19:53.068
and takes again the familiar themes
of the Frieze of Life
03:19:53.188 --> 03:19:56.868
reducing them to
an essential force and simplicity
03:19:56.948 --> 03:20:00.428
for which he has been searching
for 10 years.
03:20:11.868 --> 03:20:14.108
Seeking for more effective ways
of spreading
03:20:14.228 --> 03:20:16.428
his philosophy of life and death
03:20:17.388 --> 03:20:20.068
constantly fighting against
what he sees as
03:20:20.228 --> 03:20:22.988
the suppression of
his own personality
03:20:23.148 --> 03:20:25.348
Edvard Munch turns more and more
03:20:25.668 --> 03:20:28.468
to graphic art
with its multiple prints.
03:20:28.748 --> 03:20:31.668
Within one year
his graphic output has tripled
03:20:31.748 --> 03:20:35.388
as he turns from dry-point
to etching to wood-cut
03:20:35.708 --> 03:20:39.188
to lithography
in black and white and colour.
03:24:14.667 --> 03:24:18.387
In a letter written by
the nurse of Peter Andreas Munch
03:24:19.028 --> 03:24:20.707
were these words:
03:24:22.028 --> 03:24:25.667
"He asked me to read a little
to him on the Friday afternoon.
03:24:25.787 --> 03:24:28.868
"He wanted Christ's speech
from the summit.
03:24:29.668 --> 03:24:33.788
"With each attack of suffocation
I had to give him a shot of naphtha.
03:24:33.907 --> 03:24:36.907
"In the last attack three shots.
03:24:37.428 --> 03:24:42.228
"On the Saturday night, we put him
in his bridegroom clothes."
03:24:44.748 --> 03:24:49.468
Your paper has mentioned
Munch's paintings as
03:24:49.628 --> 03:24:53.708
"confused and inarticulate,
dreadful
03:24:53.907 --> 03:24:56.068
or nauseating distortions."
03:24:56.148 --> 03:24:56.988
Yes.
03:24:57.988 --> 03:25:00.388
Isn't that rather strong language?
03:25:00.507 --> 03:25:06.547
Yes, it is. What we feel
for Munch's painting is expressed
03:25:06.667 --> 03:25:11.988
in a footnote I added
personally to our review:
03:25:12.468 --> 03:25:18.428
"It is true the public is annoyed
by these disgusting works.
03:25:19.307 --> 03:25:25.108
"How regrettable then that
such exhibitions draw full houses.
03:25:25.467 --> 03:25:29.707
"An empty gallery would best
control these extravagances."
03:25:31.548 --> 03:25:37.188
I agree with Aftonposten.
This is not art, it is dirt.
03:26:08.708 --> 03:26:11.947
For the next 14 years,
Edvard Munch is to lead a life
03:26:12.107 --> 03:26:15.107
of increasing pain and isolation.
03:26:15.188 --> 03:26:20.427
His illness, aggravated by smoking
and alcohol, is to grow worse.
03:26:20.867 --> 03:26:24.348
He is torn by the themes
of jealousy and suffering
03:26:24.707 --> 03:26:26.627
by the thought of
his own death
03:26:26.787 --> 03:26:29.387
and his descent into a literal Hell.
03:26:45.947 --> 03:26:49.107
The conservative press is to
continue its attacks on his work
03:26:49.348 --> 03:26:53.268
and other than for periods
spent at Åsgårdstrand
03:26:53.347 --> 03:26:55.947
where he once met
with Mrs Heiberg
03:26:56.028 --> 03:26:58.348
he is to spend most of 14 years
03:26:58.668 --> 03:27:02.228
travelling endlessly
from one country to another.
03:27:03.348 --> 03:27:06.748
He is to paint a major theme,
The Dance of Life
03:27:06.868 --> 03:27:09.348
in which the couples
do not see each other.
03:27:23.947 --> 03:27:25.788
Look at these streets.
03:27:26.108 --> 03:27:28.948
Human creatures
set upon one another.
03:27:29.147 --> 03:27:32.148
Buses run with
countless human souls.
03:27:33.307 --> 03:27:37.547
They look indifferently on
the happy man, alone outside.
03:28:20.228 --> 03:28:24.788
Though most of his work is to deal with
the problems of human communication
03:28:25.027 --> 03:28:28.667
Munch is to try again
with two more relationships
03:28:28.788 --> 03:28:33.187
one of which will result in
physical and psychic injury
03:28:33.268 --> 03:28:37.148
And following a nervous breakdown,
he will finally place himself
03:28:37.227 --> 03:28:42.348
into a psychiatric clinic
in Copenhagen in 1908.
03:28:49.748 --> 03:28:52.827
At the same time,
Munch is to be notified
03:28:52.947 --> 03:28:54.867
that he has been made a Knight
03:28:55.027 --> 03:28:58.268
of the Royal Norwegian Order
of St. Olav.
03:29:15.747 --> 03:29:18.067
Did you notice me much before?
03:29:23.508 --> 03:29:25.587
Yes, I often looked at you.
03:29:29.388 --> 03:29:31.308
I thought you looked like Christ.
03:29:41.547 --> 03:29:42.907
Sit here.
03:30:16.828 --> 03:30:19.067
We wish to thank the men, women and
children of Oslo and Åsgårdstrand
03:30:19.148 --> 03:30:20.787
who appear in this film.
03:30:33.867 --> 03:30:38.027
Director of Photography
03:30:38.228 --> 03:30:42.147
Lighting Supervisors
Sound Supervisors
03:30:42.267 --> 03:30:47.028
Production Designer
Properties Supervisor
03:30:47.227 --> 03:30:51.067
Costume Design
Make-Up
03:30:59.587 --> 03:31:02.027
Production Manager
03:31:02.187 --> 03:31:06.628
We are very grateful
for invaluable help from
03:31:06.748 --> 03:31:12.227
Additional thanks
03:31:12.427 --> 03:31:15.147
We wish to thank the staff at
the Munch Museum in Oslo
03:31:15.268 --> 03:31:18.747
without whose help this film
could not have been made.
03:31:18.907 --> 03:31:21.028
Directed and Edited by PETER WATKINS
and written in collaboration
03:31:21.148 --> 03:31:23.867
with the cast, many of whom express
their own opinions.
03:31:27.107 --> 03:31:30.667
Edvard Munch's aunt, Karen Bjølstad
03:31:31.067 --> 03:31:32.668
will never marry.
03:31:33.908 --> 03:31:37.827
His sister Inger will never marry.
03:31:39.227 --> 03:31:43.307
Laura Munch will withdraw
deeper into her isolation
03:31:43.388 --> 03:31:47.947
and will spend a brief period
in a clinic.
03:31:49.667 --> 03:31:52.347
Oda Lasson is to break with
with Gunnar Heiberg
03:31:52.708 --> 03:31:55.947
and to become the lover
of a Norwegian doctor
03:31:56.347 --> 03:32:00.147
while remaining married
to Christian Krohg.
03:32:02.387 --> 03:32:05.307
Åse Carlsen will remain married
03:32:05.427 --> 03:32:09.308
until her death at the age of 40.
03:32:09.947 --> 03:32:14.427
Dagny Juel, accompanied by
Stanislaw Przybyszewski
03:32:14.907 --> 03:32:19.147
will go to Tiflis
to meet with a Russian lover
03:32:19.868 --> 03:32:22.027
who will shoot her through the head.
03:32:23.827 --> 03:32:30.708
The woman known as "Mrs Heiberg" will
divorce for the second time in 1911.
03:32:31.788 --> 03:32:35.427
She and Edvard Munch
will never meet again.
03:32:48.347 --> 03:32:52.347
"I felt as if there were
invisible threads between us.
03:32:52.947 --> 03:32:56.267
"I felt as if invisible threads
from her hair
03:32:56.427 --> 03:32:59.667
"still twisted themselves
around me.
03:33:01.267 --> 03:33:05.187
"And when she completely
disappeared there, over the ocean
03:33:05.747 --> 03:33:11.787
"then I felt still how it hurt,
where my heart bled
03:33:12.747 --> 03:33:16.907
"because the threads
could not be broken."