New York Times. Mar 20, 1932.
Mural Paintings In Oslo
Edvard Munch’s Work in Oil
By Alma Luise Olson. Oslo.
The suggestion that Edvard Munch’s
oil frieze, called "Work," will find a permanent place in the new
Oslo Town Hall, when it is built, is of interest. (In parenthesis: the cornerstone
has been laid for the building and the published plans reveal strikingly modernistic
and pleasing effects; whole city squares are being laid low to make room for
it and the house wreckers are coming dangerously near the historic house near
the National Theatre where Ibsen once lived. By the time these lines are in
print this attempt at a breathless protest will probably come too late!)
Though Munch does not work in fresco, as all remember who are familiar with
his wall paintings in the university "aula," he does achieve monumental
effect. He also does "architectural paintings" with his own medium,
to quote Arne Nygaard Nilssen, who tells a detailed story of modern Norwegian
fresco painting in a valuable and richly illustrated monograph. Somehow, murals
as art expression seem indigenous to this country, where almost every town or
village is hemmed in by mountain walls on which nature lavishes a whole prism
of green, in all the varying shades, each season with advent of Spring.