Edvard Munch – Self-Portrait by the Window

Self-Portrait by the Window

Self-Portrait by the Window by Edvard Munch is an oil painting on canvas of 1940, held under inventory number MM.M.00446 by the Munch Museum (Munchmuseet) in Oslo. The original measures 108 x 84 cm. The painter stands by the window of his house in the left half of the canvas, while the right half is taken up by the view onto a snow-covered winter outside.

Munch’s face is painted in a strong orange-red, almost brick, which is the most unusual thing in the whole picture. He is bald on top, with sparse pale grey-green hair at the sides. The brows are heavy, the eyes a pale blue-grey and the mouth turned down; the expression is serious and without a smile. Below the chin a lighter green shirt shows with a dark tie, and over everything he wears a broad dark blue-green jacket that fills the whole lower left of the canvas. The wall behind him is a warm salmon pink.

The right half is taken by a large window in a green frame. Through it winter is visible: dark green spruce boughs bent under snow, a bare reddish-brown sapling and broad planes of white snow in cold grey shades. Below the window runs a green ledge with pale oval strokes. The painting is divided in two by this: the left half is warm and the right is cold, and that division is its structure.

Munch was about seventy-seven in 1940 and was living at Ekely, the property above Oslo; he died in January 1944, so this self-portrait is among his last. In his late years he painted himself again and again, often in his own rooms and often beside a window or a door. Our reproduction follows the version in the Munch Museum measuring 108 x 84 cm.

The paint is applied quickly and visibly, in long strokes that are not hidden. The jacket is built from vertical sweeps, the snow outside from short, flatter ones. There are almost no contours; the face separates from the wall only by being redder than it. In several places, above all along the edges, the paint is thin and the ground shows through beneath it.

Ours is an oil on canvas reproduction, hand-painted, stroke by stroke, and never printed. Because each canvas is made specifically for the order, no two match down to the detail; the small differences in the paint are the mark of a hand rather than a flaw. With this motif the hardest thing is the orange-red of the face, which must stay warm and must not slide into brown.

The painting is upright, calm and unusually light for a late Munch, so it works well in a room that has real daylight: beside a window, in a study or in a dining room. Because of the green and salmon combination it is best hung on a neutral wall – white, pale grey or sand – that does not double either colour. As wall decor place it at eye level; since this is a self-portrait, the scene only works once your look meets the painter’s. Cold light does not suit his face, while warm light strengthens the difference between the interior and the winter outside.

Ten sizes are available along with a custom size, and every canvas can be ordered framed or unframed. More of the artist is in the Edvard Munch gallery, and we write about his life and painting on the Edvard Munch blog.