SATYRICON Exhibition 'Satyricon & Munch' To Open This Week

In a unique collaboration with the world-famous Munch museum in Oslo, Norwegian black metallers SATYRICON have created a musical composition in album format specifically to be experienced in a new exhibition called "Satyricon & Munch" alongside selected paintings and graphics by Edvard Munch. Not only does this continue to present Munch's extraordinary work in a new light, but the result is also a monumental yet intimate experience.

The intersection of Munch's expressionist images and SATYRICON's music creates a space for contemplation that goes way beyond the traditional form of black metal. Like Munch, SATYRICON's approach is open, inquisitive and constantly evolving. The music is stamped with an unmistakable signature, but the piece's style, duration and expressiveness display a new angle on their previous work.

"'I don't paint what I see, but what I saw', was how Munch explained his own artistic approach," says SATYRICON frontman Sigurd "Satyr" Wongraven. "While working on this music, I have approached this series of Munch's works in the same way. 'The feeling they have left behind in me', as he put it, is what I have been trying to evoke, and that's what the 'Satyricon & Munch' exhibition is all about for me.'

The Munch artworks selected for this exhibition draw on existential themes, and are carefully curated in order to create rhythms and waves that work in tandem with the music.

"In this show, the public can look forward to an incredible meeting between music and art," says Munch director Stein Olav Henrichsen. "Munch will continue to offer challenges and surprises with these types of untraditional and exciting culture clashes."

Watch Satyr's conversation with Munch curator Trine Otte Bak Nielsen about the exhibition below.

Munch museum in Oslo is one of the most famous museums in the world, dedicated to the works of famous Norwegian artist Edvard Munch. The museum holds paintings such as "The Scream", "Madonna" and "Anxiety". It re-opened in October 2021 with an impressive building in the heart of Oslo that gained even more attention worldwide. The collaboration between one of the world's most well-known black metal bands and the museum is unique on a worldwide scale.

Last May, Satyr told Finland's Kaaos TV that he was "midway through" making SATYRICON's follow-up to 2017's "Deep Calleth Upon Deep" album. Asked if the Norwegian "folk" music influence will find its way on to the record, he said (as transcribed by BLABBERMOUTH.NET): "Yeah, there are some guitar things that clearly [have] the typical SATYRICON incorporation of that type of tonality. But perhaps the most important part is my peculiar rhythmical patterns which some of my colleagues find to be troubling because they are inconsiderate of the rules of rock music and any other kind of structure and more based around the freedom that I feel is in Norwegian folk music. So that some of the parts that I write, you can't really anticipate where the chord progression is going to end because I don't necessarily follow established rhythmical patterns for how music is done. I let the idea and the melody line lead the way."

"Deep Calleth Upon Deep" was released in September 2017 via Napalm Records. The disc was recorded in Oslo, Norway and Vancouver, Canada, during early 2017 and mixed together with revered studio guru Mike Fraser (who previously worked on SATYRICON's 2006 album, "Now, Diabolical").

SATYRICON's first two albums, 1993's "Dark Medieval Times" and 1994's "The Shadowthrone", were released as remixed and remastered reissues with altered cover artworks, in May 2021 via Napalm Records.

Photo credit: Morten Andersen