The Hearse on Potsdamer Platz

In February 1902 Berlin opened its first underground railway, and one end of the line surfaced right here, on Potsdamer Platz. The square was already the loudest crossing in the city, with horse buses, electric trams and crowds coming off the trains. Munch spent that year in Berlin, where the Secession gave him a room for the 22 pictures he called the Frieze of Life. Out of the busiest place in Germany he chose a funeral carriage, moving through the traffic while the city carries on around it. He painted the subject more than once. This is the large canvas, about 1.6 metres across, and the Munch Museum in Oslo holds a smaller version of the same street.