Edvard Munch wrote ‘painted by a madman’ on masterpiece The Scream

People look at The Scream at the National Gallery in Oslo (Heiko Junge/NTB Scanpix via AP)

A small, barely visible sentence written with a pencil on Edvard Munch’s 1893 masterpiece The Scream was penned by the Norwegian painter himself, according to Norway’s National Museum.

The painting, which shows a waif-like figure cradling its head in its hands with its mouth agape, has become a global icon for the expression of human anxiety. The sentence – “can only have been painted by a madman” – was scribbled in the top left-hand corner.