Edvard Munch: Who scribbled on “The Scream”?

Viewers of the famous painting “ The  Scream” have to look very carefully to decipher the message written in pencil. “Kan kun være malet af en gal Mand!” Is written in Norwegian in the upper left corner of the “Schrei” original – that is, translated: “Can only have been painted by a madman!”

Who wrote the sentence and when, caused a lot of speculation. Was it even an act of vandalism?

Munch himself is said to be the author

New studies now point in a different direction. According to the curators of the Norwegian National Museum of Art, Architecture and Design in Oslo, the message comes from the painter Edvard Munch himself.

 The  painting from 1893 is owned by the museum.

Every letter, every word corresponds in every way to Munch’s handwriting, said curator Mai Britt Guleng. “

 The re is no longer any doubt.” First the New York Times reported on it.

“Remarkably little attention received”

 The  scribble was first mentioned in 1904 – eleven years after the picture was completed. At that time it was believed that a visitor had written the message on the picture. But one was not sure. “Given that this is such an important work in the history of international art, the inscription has received remarkably little attention,” says Guleng. Until now.

Munch himself had painted four versions of

 The  Scream. Only the first one contains the inscription.

 The  Norwegian National Museum has two other versions, the fourth belongs to a private collector. Munch noted in his diary that the painting was inspired by a “touch of melancholy”.

 The  painting has now become a symbol of fear and the “Mona Lisa” of modern art.

Most visitors could not even recognize the lettering, said curator Guleng. Mainly because the painting can only be seen behind glass. Only recordings with an infrared camera made the letters clearly visible. “You really have to make an effort to recognize it,” says Guleng. “Had it been vandalism, it would have been written larger.”

 The  scientists compared the lettering with Munch’s handwriting. Especially the spelling of the N and D were unmistakable.

Munch himself feared a hereditary disease in the family

Munch probably wrote the message on the painting during an exhibition by an art dealer in Oslo in 1895. At that time, the painting was presented to a wider public for the first time – and did not exactly receive praise.

 The  director of the Norwegian Art Museum at the time wrote in a letter that the picture showed that Munch could no longer be taken for a serious man with a normal brain.

In a discussion that followed the exhibition, a medical student is said to have questioned Munch’s state of mind.

 The  student is said to have said that Munch is abnormal. Munch, who was probably present at the discussion himself, is said to have been deeply hurt by it and to have talked about it years later.

“Munch was concerned that there might be a hereditary disease in his family,” said Guleng. “Both his father and grandfather suffered from what was then known as melancholy. His sister had to be treated in a psychiatric hospital. ”According to Guleng, the inscription could have been the reaction to what was said. With this sentence, Munch may have tried ironically to regain control over his painting.