The scene in the mirror is the background of the painting “The Scream” and the driver is the screamer. I’m not sure what the joke is supposed to be. Is he driving out of the painting? He passes by that scene and starts to scream?
Philip’s got it. The figures on the roadside are in the original. I think he must have just started screaming, judging by his passenger’s reaction. Possibly he’s upset to have hit traffic.
I learned recently that the central figure in “The Scream” isn’t the screamer, but someone hearing a scream. Nature itself is screaming, causing horror and anxiety in the listener.
“I sensed a scream passing through nature; it seemed to me that I heard the scream.”
So the title it was originally exibited under was: Der Schrei der Natur (The Scream of Nature).
I’m sure y’all have it. I know the painting but didn’t recognize the hands from behind–I thought those were just weird ears!
Interesting thing is, from the angle we are looking in the mirror, we should see the driver’s face and the inside of the car, not the landscape.
As I understand it, Mark H., cartoonists are exempt from the laws of physics. Thus the angle of reflection need not equal the angle of incidence.
Comics I Don't Understand 
The central figure from Edvard Munch’s “The Scream” is in the driver’s seat. In the rearview mirror is the painting with that figure removed.
Edvard Munch, 1893, The Scream, oil, tempera and pastel on cardboard, 91 x 73 cm, National Gallery of Norway – The Scream – Wikipedia
The scene in the mirror is the background of the painting “The Scream” and the driver is the screamer. I’m not sure what the joke is supposed to be. Is he driving out of the painting? He passes by that scene and starts to scream?
Philip’s got it. The figures on the roadside are in the original. I think he must have just started screaming, judging by his passenger’s reaction. Possibly he’s upset to have hit traffic.
I learned recently that the central figure in “The Scream” isn’t the screamer, but someone hearing a scream. Nature itself is screaming, causing horror and anxiety in the listener.
“I sensed a scream passing through nature; it seemed to me that I heard the scream.”
So the title it was originally exibited under was: Der Schrei der Natur (The Scream of Nature).
I’m sure y’all have it. I know the painting but didn’t recognize the hands from behind–I thought those were just weird ears!
Interesting thing is, from the angle we are looking in the mirror, we should see the driver’s face and the inside of the car, not the landscape.
As I understand it, Mark H., cartoonists are exempt from the laws of physics. Thus the angle of reflection need not equal the angle of incidence.
I recognised the painting. But what is the joke?