Edvard Munch, Meeting in Space, 1925–29, oil on canvas. Munchmuseet, MM.M.00664, © Artists Rights Society (ARS), New York. Photo: Munchmuseet

Munch’s artistic practice was impacted by his overlapping interests in philosophy, religion, and the natural sciences. Raised in a staunchly Christian household, in adulthood Munch’s religious views were shaped by scientific theories of Darwinian evolution and Monism, a philosophical belief that all existence—both organic and inorganic—is unified. The position of humans as part of a cosmic cycle is a recurrent theme in his art, one often associated with his iconic image of modern anxiety, The Scream. The artist linked humankind to nature and the cosmos with images of people stretching upwards towards the sun or growing out of the earth. These motifs suggest that everything in nature is intertwined and there are no clear distinctions between internal and external, material and non-material, living and dead.