Andreas Munch Studying Anatomy

Andreas Munch Studying Anatomy, at the Munch Museum, depicts Edvard's younger brother Andreas bent over anatomical texts—a subject appropriate to Andreas's studies in medicine, which he pursued before his early death in 1895. Painted in 1886, the work shows Edvard observing his brother with the quiet attentiveness he brought to family subjects. The combination of concentrated study and the associations of anatomy with death gives the painting a forward-looking quality, foreshadowing the themes of mortality that would dominate Edvard's mature art.

The figure of Andreas is shown in a three-quarter view, bending over a surface below the picture's lower edge, his concentration signaled by the tilt of his head and the placing of his hands. Munch uses relatively warm, contained brushwork that reads as controlled naturalism, the dark clothing and shadowed space around the figure creating a focused, studious atmosphere.