The reputation of Norwegian artist Edvard Munch has never been higher. In recent decades, scholars have elevated his role in the history of art while collectors fueled an explosion in prices for his work. His best-known creation, “The Scream,” is familiar to millions. Yet at Oslo’s Munch Museum, gallery space was actually shrinking after a 2004 robbery forced an increase in security measures, while a series of special exhibitions edged out any permanent installation of its namesake’s art.
That is set to change with the inauguration of a brand-new, high-rise museum on Oct. 22. MUNCH, as it will now be called, occupies a new 13-story tower designed by Madrid’s Estudio Herreros in the heart of Oslo’s redeveloped waterfront. The building nearly quintuples the exhibition space of the earlier museum and will feature several new displays of the artist’s work, including “Edvard Munch Monumental,” a permanent display of key oversize paintings from the 1910s and 20s, and “Up Close,” a temporary show about Munch’s woodcut prints. The total number of Munch works on view will rise to over 400, including rarities such as the 1943 print “Kiss in the Field,” made the year before the artist’s death during Germany’s occupation of Norway.
