Painting from Emotions: Edvard Munch's Struggle with Bipolar Disorder

Painting from Emotions: Edvard Munch's Struggle with Bipolar Disorder

He was a man surrounded by death and grief - the blackest emotions and deepest sadness. When he died in the winter of 1944, he left over 20,000 pieces of his work to the city of Oslo, where he was born. Edvard Munch, known for his breathtakingly beautiful painting The Scream, was a man who probably had many things to shout about in his own life, not least his suspected bipolar disorder.

Once referred to as “manic depression” (a term now considered outdated), this brutal psychological condition primarily manifests itself in intense mood swings, severe depression, and fluctuations in energy levels. These changes can disappear as quickly as possible, giving rise to the term “bipolar,” literally opposite poles on the emotional spectrum. An exact cause of the occurrence of bipolarism remains unknown, and even less was understood about it during Munch's life. A person suffering from this disease often goes through cycles or periods in which they experience unusually large fluctuations and changes in their moods, energy levels, and depression. Some in the medical field believe that traumatic events and excessive stress, particularly during a patient's youth, can significantly increase the risk of bipolar disorder either at the time of the trauma or in the years that follow.

In the first years of his life after his birth in 1863, Munch watched his parents, a sister and a brother die. Over the years, other siblings and close relatives died, and another sister was diagnosed with mental illness. With so much death and illness on his young mind, it's almost too easy to understand how and why this Norwegian artist created artworks that were less concerned with some cheerful impressionism of the time and more concerned with capturing the essence of emotions and moods. Plagued by fear and perhaps a feeling of loneliness, Edvard decided to enroll in art school in 1881. With his life in tow, Munch began traveling between Paris and Norway (and later Germany), studying the great artists and art movements of the time.

Although for the most part Munch's work was not entirely macabre, it was generally a far cry from the flower gardens and ballet dancers that the best Impressionists were painting with the cart at the time. Instead, Munch wanted to convey more than just a scene. He wanted his images to be full of emotion, energy, deeper meaning and complexity. However, even with this in mind, his art style would change several times (a theme also noted with other artists such as Picasso) as he dabbled in Impressionism, Synthetism, and other genres that were popular at the time. Edvard, borrowing techniques here and inventing others there, continued to be a pillar in the creation of the German Expressionism movement. In Expressionism, Munch found a way to look beyond the perfectionism of realists and impressionists and bring forth emotions on canvas, wood, or any of the many media he chose to work with. Just as Edvard Munch's work would take on a more optimistic vibe in his later years, this gifted artist's moods and emotions changed greatly throughout his life, raising suspicions that he suffered from bipolar disorder.

Munch is not the only artist believed or known to have suffered from the condition. In fact, some researchers tend to believe that this can give rise to deep forms of different creativity. Famous names from Hans Christian Andersen to Virginia Woolf, Napoleon to Marilyn Monroe are just a few of the stars, icons and historians who may have battled this psychological condition. Now, just as during Munch's lifetime, there is no fail-safe treatment for bipolar disorder. With his memories as inspiration and his moods as a medium, there was perhaps nothing else to do but turn to art so that Munch could harness his inner earthquakes of emotion, energy, and depression to cope with his own bipolar disorder. Indeed, Edvard Munch transformed melancholy and mania into timeless art, giving the world an incredible collection of creative, poignant work.

Inspired by Jessica Cander