"My art had its roots in my search for an explanation of life's inconsistencies. Why was I not like other people? Why was I born, when I never asked to be?". Edvard Munch.
Warnemünde, a beach town on the Baltic sea, 1907. A man stands by a window, painting. In the depth of space he paints deformed and menacing objects. The colours become brutal, the shapes swirl. He’s obsessed by the thought of Tulla, of his feelings for her between love and hate, between desire and uncontrollable jealousy. The natural restlessness which has characterised him since childhood, is slowly turning into fear. Fear of what he feels inside. The man in the novel is Edvard Munch, the Norwegian painter famous for using art to express his most inner thoughts and conflicts. He lived through two centuries, the 19th and the 20th, and in two worlds: his isolated life in the freezing northern landscapes, and his forced association with gallery owners, customers and merchants in the European capitals, who sensed his talent but didn’t want to constrain his personality. Munch’s anxiety reaches a peak in 1908, when he commits himself to a psychiatric clinic in Copenhagen. Tanja Langer sketches an unusual and introspective portrait of this great artist. With a dry and sometimes obsessive style, which seems to suit her subject perfectly, she captivates her readers and drags them into the depth of the painter’s psyche.