Workers Returning Home is an iconic painting by Norwegian artist Edvard Munch, completed between 1913 and 1914. The painting is regarded as one of the largest artworks that Munch ever created, and it depicts the working class of the period. Throughout his career, Munch explored themes of mortality and expressed these ideas through works that exhibit intense color, semi-abstraction, and enigmatic subjects.
The painting belongs to a series called The Frieze of Life, where Munch examined themes such as life, love, fear, death and melancholia. Workers Returning Home preeminently represents the industrialization era in Norway which led to increased poverty among workers who embarked on physically demanding jobs with little pay. In this artwork, the workers are portrayed as tired with gloomy facial expressions indicating their struggle for survival.
One lingering feature that makes this artwork quite distinctive is its size – standing at a towering height of over 10 feet tall! Workers Returning Home can be found at its current home within the walls of the Munch Museum in Norway; however, countless reproductions exist throughout galleries around Europe. Edvard Munch was a Norwegian painter whose masterpieces would influence German expressionism in modern art throughout Europe.
