Barely visible in the upper left corner of one of the most famous paintings in the world are the words: “It could only have been painted by a madman!” For years, curators and art historians have wondered who wrote it.
After decades of debate, experts confirmed this week that the artist himself, Edvard Munch, is responsible for the inscription on his most famous work, “The Scream”.
According to the National Museum of Norway, a Danish art critic first noticed the inscription during an exhibition in Copenhagen in 1904 – believing that a member of the public wrote it as an act of vandalism.
The new infrared scans, which do not affect the painting, showed that Munch left the small phrase on the corner of the painting, written in pencil after the work was already completed. The museum analyzed the handwriting and compared it to Munch’s diaries and letters of the time.
“The writing is undoubtedly Munch’s,” said Mai Britt Guleng, curator at the National Museum. “The handwriting itself, as well as the events that took place in 1895, when Munch first showed painting in Norway, all point in the same direction.”
Annar Bjorgli / National Museum
The museum has confirmed the origins of the inscription, while the painting is being extensively preserved in preparation for its installation in Oslo, Munch’s hometown, next year.
“Writing has always been visible to the naked eye, but it has been very difficult to interpret,” said Thierry Ford, curator of paintings at the National Museum. “Through the microscope, you can see that the pencil lines are physically above the paint and were applied after the painting was finished.”
After The Scream debuted in 1895, Munch received sharp criticism, including from the art community and a medical student, Johan Scharffenberg, who questioned his mental state during a debate in which Munch was present.
Henrik Grosch, then director of the Norwegian Museum of Decorative Art and Design, wrote that Munch’s paintings showed that he could no longer “consider Munch a serious man with a normal brain.”
For years, Munch referred to comments in his notes, clearly deeply hurt by the decisions.
“The theory is that Munch wrote this after hearing Scharffenberg’s judgment of his mental health sometime in or after 1895,” Guleng said of the inscription. “It’s reasonable to assume he did it pretty soon, either during the show or after it.”
National Museum / Børre Høstland
Expressionist painting is now widely celebrated in modern times, considered a lasting representation of anxiety and distress. In his diary, Munch wrote that the painting was inspired by “a burst of melancholy.”
Both Munch’s father and grandfather suffered from depression, and his sister was admitted to Gaustad Psychiatric Hospital. Munch was hospitalized after a nervous breakdown in 1908.
“The inscription can be read as an ironic comment, but at the same time as an expression of the artist’s vulnerability,” Guleng said. “Writing on the finished painting shows that creating for Munch was an ongoing process.”
The painting, which is one of four, has rarely been seen since it was briefly stolen nearly 20 years ago. In 2021, a pastel version sold for nearly $ 120 million during a Sotheby’s auction in New York – a world record at the time.