1:07:06
Edvard Munch is aware that
he has made a major breakthrough
1:07:09
in terms of his own art.
1:07:12
But he is not yet aware of
the dimensions of this breakthrough.
1:07:16
At this time, in the mid-1880's,
1:07:19
each of the major artists
in the Western World
1:07:22
is still involved in the traditional
presentation of the exterior reality.
1:07:28
Cézanne,
1:07:30
the early work of Gauguin
1:07:32
and, even at this stage,
1:07:34
Vincent Van Gogh.
1:07:37
The difference between these works
and Munch's canvas,
1:07:40
is most clearly seen in
1:07:42
the contemporary presentation
of young women.
1:07:44
Auguste Renoir,
1:07:47
Berthe Morisot,
1:07:49
the American Mary Cassatt,
1:07:51
the Norwegian Hans Heyerdahl.
1:07:56
But Edvard Munch's canvas,
with its deeply scored surface,
1:08:01
which has transcended
all exterior reality
1:08:04
to become the first
expressionist painting of "feeling"
1:08:09
in the history of Western art,
1:08:11
is strongly attacked
both by the Kristiania public
1:08:15
and by its conservative press.
1:08:22
The public won't accept
that sort of madness.
1:08:27
Every time one passes
1:08:29
this painting people are standing
laughing at it.
1:08:33
Some people always set themselves up
as guardians over others.
1:08:39
In literature they decide
what is decent and indecent.
1:08:45
Says one colleague to Munch,
1:08:46
"I think that your painting is shit."
1:08:49
Asks another,
1:08:51
"What are all those strokes for?
It looks like it's raining."
1:08:55
A human life is decent but to write
1:08:58
about human sexual life is indecent.