Physics 1909

Edvard Munch made this strange and tender image, ‘Physics’, on canvas with what looks like thin washes of paint. It feels like a work in progress, a set of ideas and marks that were never fully resolved, and this adds to its beauty. There is a skull near the bottom, a couple embracing above, and these hard, angular lines cutting across the scene. The palette is restrained, almost faded, with these gentle blues and reds. See how the paint is so thin, almost transparent, in places. It feels like we're seeing through layers of memory. For me, the best art opens up a space of questioning rather than closing it down. Munch does this so well. His paintings feel like these unresolved emotional states, always in flux, much like the work of Francis Picabia, who also embraced a kind of beautiful chaos in his art making.