Art History Connections

Another guest blog written by HomoDommi:

Edvard Munch's "The Scream" (1893, Oslo, Norway.)

Munch described the creative germ for this series of incredibly famous paintings as having sensed an infinite scream passing through nature.

Paul Gauguin's Where Do We Come From? What Are We? Where Are We Going?  (1897 - Tahiti.)

Gauguin regarded Where Do We Come From... as his finest work (now housed in the Boston Museum of Fine Arts, this screen-capture from Wikipedia may not be entirely copyright-free).

Where Do We Come From... is supposed to be read from right to left, representing youth to aged death.  On the far left, you can see an old woman, resigned to her thoughts, reconciling her life.  At her feet, said Gauguin, is a strange white bird ...represent[ing] the futility of words.

(detail)

What I learned last month:

Gauguin and Munch were friends, and in 1889 attended the Paris World's Fair together.  Gauguin's mother was Peruvian, and he himself spent his childhood in Lima, Peru, so he steered Munch under the newly-built Eiffel tower to the South American exhibit.  Happenstance, the exhibit included Peruvian mummies (who'd been sacrificed alive -- dread people, the Incas).  [I -- Vivi -- will interject here that I can't find reference on the internet today to live mummification in Peru. But I do not disagree with HomoDommi's greater point that the Incas were scary.]

Here's one of the mummies, clip-n-pasted between the two paintings.

The Scream - actual Peruvian mummy - Gauguin's old woman

Yep -- both masterpieces were based on a mummy that Munch and Gauguin saw together at the Paris World's Exposition in 1889!  Note: the specific mummy is in a museum in Florence, Italy, and I couldn't find a jpg of it. According to Wikipedia, the mummy above is similar, with the same Peruvian history (i.e., buried alive).

-- Isn't this bizarre and remarkable?  A woman is sacrificed in 1300 in Peru. Her body is uncovered 600 years later and taken half way 'round the world to France, where it is viewed by a depressive Norwegian and an absinthe-loving half-Frenchman, in an exhibit under the Eiffel Tower.  And two of the more remarkable art works of the 19th Century result from the viewing.

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And this is what I learned last week:

This is Bohumil Kafka, a Czech artist (no relation to German/Czech author Franz Kafka).  Notice the sculpture on the pedestal at his side.

Bohumil Kafka - image from HomoDommi

It is titled The Mummies -- and no surprise -- Bohumil Kafka also attended the 1889 World's Fair.  I couldn't find copies of these photos on the web, so I've scanned these images from a library book. Not good reproductions, but it's clearly one of the same mummies that so struck Gauguin and Munch.

The Mummies - image from HomoDommi