Puberty is a painting

Painting

Painting is the practice of applying paint, pigment, color or other medium to a surface . The application of the medium is commonly applied to the base with a brush but other objects can be used. In art, the term painting describes both the act and the result of the action. However, painting is...

 created by Edvard Munch

Edvard Munch

Edvard Munch was a Norwegian Symbolist painter, printmaker and an important forerunner of expressionist art. His best-known composition, The Scream, is part of a series The Frieze of Life, in which Munch explored the themes of love, fear, death, melancholia, and anxiety.- Childhood :Edvard Munch...

. Munch is an artist native to Norway

Norway

Norway , officially the Kingdom of Norway, is a Nordic unitary constitutional monarchy whose territory comprises the western portion of the Scandinavian Peninsula, Jan Mayen, and the Arctic archipelago of Svalbard and Bouvet Island. Norway has a total area of and a population of about 4.9 million...

 and is widely known for his role in expressionistic art. Puberty has also been done as a lithograph and an etching

Etching

Etching is the process of using strong acid or mordant to cut into the unprotected parts of a metal surface to create a design in intaglio in the metal...

 by Munch.

Genesis

In the late 1880s and into the mid 1890's Munch, in his mid-twenties, had begun to create his series of Puberty pieces. At this time Munch had already established himself as a notable

Notable

Notable can refer to:* the property of a thing having notability* A Notable is a member of the Assembly of Notables, an assembly called by the king of high-ranking notables.* A Wikipedia guideline Wikipedia:Notable...

 artist in Berlin

Berlin

Berlin is the capital city of Germany and is one of the 16 states of Germany. With a population of 3.45 million people, Berlin is Germany's largest city. It is the second most populous city proper and the seventh most populous urban area in the European Union...

. During this period of his life Munch often found residence in Berlin where his new found fame and circle of friends were. His new group of friends are attributed for helping push Munch further into his sexually depressed state of mind. Munch allowed this sexual depression to seep into Puberty and like other works he created later this piece was created with symbol

Symbol

A symbol is something which represents an idea, a physical entity or a process but is distinct from it. The purpose of a symbol is to communicate meaning. For example, a red octagon may be a symbol for "STOP". On a map, a picture of a tent might represent a campsite. Numerals are symbols for...

ism reflecting feelings which continued growing increasingly within the next ten years. This state of sexual depression is one that not only his circle of friends shared with him, but that the psychological scholars had also beed curious about having just written the first research on the stages and occurrences of puberty

Puberty

Puberty is the process of physical changes by which a child's body matures into an adult body capable of reproduction, as initiated by hormonal signals from the brain to the gonads; the ovaries in a girl, the testes in a boy...

 in young adults.

Subject matter

Upon observation of Puberty one of the strongest points in the piece to most is first the adolescent female who is placed mid-center of the painting. The second almost 'haunting' point in this painting is the shadow the female is meant to be casting. It has been speculated, because of the current sexual mind Munch was in during the time in which he painted this, that the shadow may be a hovering male genital. The thought of male genitalia to a young woman during this time of her own rapidly changing body creates a stench of tension within the piece. Another thought on the shadow is that it suggests the symbolic meaning of death. Both of these speculations on the shadow in this piece reflect well upon what Munch is known for symbolically portraying in his artwork.
The female in Puberty had originally been thought to have been a model of Munch's while he was in Berlin. The strong detail used in the collar bones of her body suggests that he very well might have used a model. Either way this young lady is trapped in a space that alludes to much controversy within her mind and surroundings.

Other's Comments on and/or Relating to Puberty

• Arne Eggum has stated in commentary published by The Masterworks of Edvard Munch regarding Munch's Puberty that Munch did not wish to replicate Félicien Rops
  Félicien Rops
  Félicien Rops was a Belgian artist, and printmaker in etching and aquatint.-Early life:Rops was born in Namur as the only son to Nicholas Rops and Sophie Maubile. He was educated at the University of Brussels...
  
  , Le Plus Bel Amour De Don Juan created in 1886.
• The painting is a duplicate of one that had been earlier destroyed in a fire. Which reiterates the confusion of the original idea in which Munch was inspired to create Puberty..
• Munch himself [like the female he has portrayed in Puberty fears things in relation to sex] feared sex due to the loss of his virginity to his cousins wife.

Munch's Mind

Munch enjoyed writing his own thoughts and in his lifetime compiled over 12,000 pages. Within his own quotations we can get a glance at what he was feeling and how he saw the world that allowed him to create as he did. It becomes obvious his feelings in such quotes:

Artistic Growth

Puberty was a spark towards the progress of his personal emotional journey in how he portrayed his feelings in his artwork.

External links

• Edvard Munch at Munch Museum
• "Puberty" at Humanitiesweb (includes an image of the painting)
• Edvard Munch biography at Lenin Imports
• Edvard Munch as a painter at Munch Museum
• Quotes from Edvard Munch (1863–1944)