The Apple Tree

Edvard Munch's 'The Apple Tree' (1902) is one of his Åsgårdstrand garden subjects — the apple tree in the garden of the Norwegian coastal village was both a specific natural subject and a figure with obvious symbolic associations (the tree of knowledge, the fall, the garden as a space of both innocence and experience). His engagement with the apple tree within his familiar Åsgårdstrand garden gave the natural subject a quality of personal familiarity alongside its broader symbolic resonance.

Munch renders the apple tree with his characteristic expressionist directness — the tree's specific form (the twisted, productive growth of an old apple tree) depicted with the energetic brushwork he brought to all his landscape subjects. His handling of the tree against the sky and the quality of the garden light creates the specific atmospheric character of the subject. The apple tree's natural form and the specific quality of its seasonal state create the composition's visual interest.