Gunnar Heiberg
1896
Medium
lithograph
Dimensions
sheet (irreg.): 47.5 × 34 cm (18 11/16 × 13 3/8 in.)
Classification
Department
CG-E
Museum
National Gallery of Art, Washington, D.C.
Credit
The Epstein Family Collection
Accession Number
1999.84.2
Art Historical Context
Edvard Munch's *Gunnar Heiberg* (1896) is a striking lithograph portrait capturing the Norwegian playwright and cultural figure Gunnar Heiberg, contemporary of Munch known for his provocative dramas. Created during Munch's prolific printmaking phase in the 1890s, this work measures 47.5 × 34 cm and exemplifies the artist's shift toward Expressionism, where emotional intensity and psychological depth eclipse realistic depiction. Munch, already famous for *The Scream* (1893), used prints like this to reach wider audiences beyond paintings, producing affordable multiples that spread his modernist...
About the Artist
Edvard Munch · 1863–1944
Edvard Munch (1863-1944) was a Norwegian painter and printmaker whose intensely psychological works made him a pioneer of Expressionism and one of the most influential artists of the modern era. His 1893 masterpiece 'The Scream' has become an iconic symbol of existential anxiety. Munch's art was profoundly shaped by personal tragedy—his mother died when he was five, his beloved sister Sophie at fo...