Edvard Munch 1863-1944.

Edvard Munch 1863 - 1944 Edvard Munch was a Norwegian artist whose brooding and anguished paintings and graphic works, based on personal grief and obsessions, were instrumental in the development of expressionism. Edvard Munch grew up in Norway's capital, Oslo, then called Christiania. His father, Christian Munch -- brother of the well-known historian P.A. Munch -- was a deeply religious military doctor earning a modest income. His wife, who was 20 years his junior, died of tuberculosis …

…later paintings are not as tortured as his earlier work, a return to introspection marks his late self-portraits, notably Between Clock and Bed (1940, Munch Museet, Oslo). Munch's considerable body of etchings, lithographs, and woodcuts is now considered a significant force in modern graphic art; the work is simple, direct, and vigorous in style, and powerful in subject matter. Few of Munch's paintings are found outside Norway. His own collection is housed in the Munch Museet.