Edvard Munch’s retreat: a secret hideaway to scream

“It is the only place where I can have peace,” Edvard Munch once wrote of Nedre Ramme’s secluded estate near the small town of Hvitsten on the Oslo Fjord. Nestled in his own private cove some 40 km south of Oslo, the summer house provided a respite from society for the Norwegian painter and printmaker, and acted as a sanctuary where he could calm his nerves. It was here that he painted many of his later masterpieces, including a monumental series of works for the Oslo University auditorium.

Born in 1863, Chew became known for exploring themes of mortality, desire, and nature in a color-drenched expressionist style, most famous in The Scream. He bought the summer home in 1910, shortly after recovering from a nervous breakdown, and kept it until his death in 1944. In the decades that followed, the property became a private home, before being purchased in 2010 by Petter Olsen. , whose family history is intertwined with that of the artist. After a lengthy restoration, the four-double-bedroom retreat has now reopened.

It’s hard to argue with Munch’s claim that the villa is the “prettiest property” on the fjord. From the surrounding farmland, the house is reached via a long drive lined with ash, pine and fir trees, to a blind spot at the water’s edge. To the right, the house sits atop the embankment, highlighted by a newly planted apple orchard and a large, solitary pear tree. It is an alluring perspective where the sea meets the rocky shoreline and still pines, and the many windows of the house refract the soft sea light.

My yellow room at Nedre Ramme is still the best room in the world

Inside, one is greeted by the heady smell of wood. Four bedrooms, one with an antique stove, are named after the painter and his friends (Edvard, Jappe, Gustav, Hans) and, along with the kitchen, dining room, and living room, are painted in the dopamine color scheme of the artist. The palette echoes the background of several of Munch’s portraits, and for good reason. As the artist once noted: “My yellow room in Nedre Ramme is still the best room in the world.”

The restoration project has been a “journey of discovery and conquest,” says Olsen, who is particularly proud to have discovered, through color archaeology, Munch’s lemon-yellow blend used on the room’s walls. and the dining room. Also, he adds, “we have searched the land, and located the places where he painted.” The artist experimented with vitalism, the notion that all living things are driven by a vital or vital force, and painted many nudes here in the open air: often his housekeeper, Ingeborg, posing on the rocks. “We have also identified the study of him outdoors,” adds Olsen. “Behind the building next to the house.”

Other features are also retained: Munch’s original outhouse still stands by the pine trees behind the house (although there are other outhouses inside). On one wall is the ghostly outline of Munch’s telephone. One of Olsen’s next ventures is to restore the dock: guests will soon be able to moor their boat in the cove.

Olsen’s connection to Munch is through his father, Thomas Fredrik Olsen, a leading Norwegian shipowner of the early 20th century and patron of the artist. The family owns one of the great collections of the artist’s work. In 2012, a version of The Scream from the Olsen Collection sold at Sotheby’s for nearly $120 million. The proceeds financed the development of the Ramme estate and the restoration of Munch’s house.

Olsen lives nearby, next door to an organic farm with rare breeds of Norwegian cattle, poultry and sheep. It also has an opulent but cozy hotel, Ramme Fjordhotell, and a gallery that houses his collection of Munch paintings, including summer portraits of Olsen’s mother, Henriette, and other Norwegian masters. Among the works on display are Munch’s paintings of Nedre Ramme’s Views: Across the Fjord into the Crystalline Landscape. He is a boisterous brother from the secluded summer house.

Today, for all its color-saturated homages to the artist, the villa ultimately remains a bucolic escape from the hubbub. As Munch declared in a letter to a friend, it has “an extravagant charm and even a stay for a few days is an experience and a rest for me.” One imagines that a new generation of visitors will feel the same attraction and, like Munch, “will travel back as soon as possible.”

Villa Munch, from NKr125,000 per night (about £9,300); ramme.no