Scream - How good is it?

Really dug Scream since the first time I saw it in a friend's house when I was going to university - it may have been the way I was feeling midway through exams that made it appealing??

http://images.chron.com/content/news/photos/04/08/22/scream.jpg

I have seen the original - and I love it. Dunno if I would want it in my house though. Some other Munchs I would - the Scream is too fraught - I like my home to be fairly calming - being a fraughtish sort of person.

Have you noticed that it used to be Craven's avatar?

Does that make him a suspect?

It's a masterpiece, done by a madman.
Stirring to watch.
I wouldn't have it my house.
It's too strong to be "decorative".

Well, I haven't seen it in person, but it does evoke a sorta weirdness. Nope. Would not hang it in my house.

I used to like The Scream(s) well enough, for its straightforward expressionism, but am a little weary of it now. Am much more interested in these -

Hans Jaeger

Midsummer Night's Dream: The Voice

Adam and Eve

Self Portrait

Self Portrait: inner turmoil

Self Portrait with Hat and Coat

and this one -

The Kiss

it's provocative, as social commentary art should be. It's not decorative.

I'm fine with the provocation, and I think houses can handle a lot of different items.

I wouldn't hang it in my home, but...

I've had a scream mousepad and coffee mug at work.

It is good, but I think Picasso and his works also the paining over the security council (don't know the name, by now) are better.

Re: Scream - How good is it?


I've owned a print since college; it's hanging right behind me here in my little home office.

You are all allowed to crack wise about my credentials as an aficianado.

Thank you for those, Osso, I too was weary of the Scream, but these are much more interesting.

Thok, I think it is a Guernica reproduction that hangs over the Security Council. There is an A2k thread about it -

http://www.able2know.com/forums/viewtopic.php?t=3755&highlight=guernica

osso, thanks. That is the painting.

I think it's one of those paintings that has become mousepadded and coffeemugged and Macaulay Culkined into submission. The original, seen without those filters, is very strong and as dys says is interesting within the historical context.

I agree with this premise; that pop culture invariably trivializes great art.

I still have an old, faded, torn t-shirt with The Disintegration of the Persistence of Memory on it, from when we visited the Dali museum in St. Petersburg, FL twelve years ago.

I use it as a chamois for my car's dashboard.

To me, the execution seems lacking, at least in the reproductions. I have a hard time believing something like this could be taken seriously - Not being contrary to rile anybody, I just don't like it.

I will have to read more of the context of the time of the painting. He painted for many years. Those I linked were over quite a span and some of the early ones that seem ordinary weren't so ordinary.

I marked The Scream as good, and would prefer to have had a very-good category to pick... but I am not so sure I would have clicked it, just on my surface reaction. I do agree that ground breaking expression in some tumultous time or perhaps stultified time, in one's life or the world's, gets some kind of points.

I am betwixt and between on it, as it is fairly simple, in a way, which is both one of its virtues and perhaps why it has worn for me. I haven't seen that many mousemats, etc. I have seen a lot of paintings since I saw, yes, only reproductions, of that, and it has been superceded, not that I am such a great analytic viewer, just talking here.

I agree that seeing in person can bring the news home. I sniffed at Renoir until I saw one for real at the Phillips Gallery in Georgetown. (I might sniff again, it's been awhile, gads what an arrogant comment.)

I guess I see Scream as representing a scream in sort of fauv-esque color, and while I get the reach at screaming in paint, I am not shaken by it.

Tell me more, those who understand, why it is a masterpiece?

To give a clue to me, I am drawn to Goya, Daumier, Kollwitz.... whatever they are, they're not fauvists. I won't say their not colorists, as I think one can be a colorist with just browns, more or less, as Goya was sometimes. Also drawn to mexican muralists, who did use vivid color and force. Ah, it's a large subject, the portrayal of agonies, large or smaller.

Which is not to say that the colors kill it for me, it is just an aspect of interest. Color didn't diminish Francis Bacon's work, re agony.