The Munch Museum (Norwegian: Munchmuseet) is a museum in Oslo, Norway dedicated to the work and life of the painter Edvard Munch.
The museum was financed from the profits generated by the Oslo municipal cinemas and opened its doors in 1963 to commemorate what would have been the painter's 100th birthday. Its collection consists of works and articles willed by Munch to the municipality of Oslo, additional works donated by his sister Inger Munch, and various other works obtained through trades of duplicate prints, etc. As a result, the museum now has in its permanent collection well over half of the artist's entire production of paintings and at least one copy of all his prints. This amounts to over 1,100 paintings, 15,500 prints covering 700 motives, six sculptures, as well as 500 plates, 2,240 books, and various other items.
In addition to its collection of works of art, the museum also contains educational and conservation sections. It has facilities for performing arts.
The museum structure was designed by the architects Gunnar Fougner and Einar Myklebust. Myklebust also played an important role in the expansion and renovation of the museum in 1994 for the 50th anniversary of Munch's death.
This place has also been the location of filming for an Olsenbanden-movie from 1984.
In the last months the City of Oslo promoved an architectural competition for a new Munch Museum in the area of Bjorvika, a new urban development were the Oslo Opera House is located. The new museum will be completed in 2013 by the Spanish studio Herreros Arquitectos.
Theft of "The Scream"
On Sunday, 22 August 2004, two paintings by Munch, The Scream and Madonna, were stolen from the Munch Museum by masked men wielding firearms. The robbers forced the museum guards to lie down on the floor while they snapped the cable securing the paintings to the wall and escaped in a black Audi A6 station wagon, which police later found abandoned. The paintings were recovered by Oslo Police on August 31, 2006. For more details on the theft see The Scream.
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