Romanticism art view of death
His name did not appear in 19th-century histories of German painting, and his canvases gathered dust in provincial storerooms. Increasingly bitter and misanthropic, Friedrich fell into virtual obscurity by his death in 1840, at the age of 65. By the 1820's his work was unfashionable in Germany compared with the primitivism of the Nazarene painters and the heroic landscapes of artists like Joseph Anton Koch. Although Goethe was one of those who sang his praises early in the 19th century, his popularity did not last. If this is not the ideal Friedrich show, Americans may get no better chance to study him, unless Germany becomes more inclined to lend works by an artist who has become a national hero.įriedrich was not always so admired. There is always in his work the feeling of expectancy, of possibility, of some unseen object beyond the painting's borders. Friedrich's canvases convey portents that can barely be discerned or that must simply be imagined. The dawn sky is visible only above the underbrush that commands most of the viewer's attention. Nor could reproductions capture the shimmering pinks in Friedrich's rendition of two swans nesting. It should dispel any impression, fostered by reproductions that obscure the subtlety of his technique, that Friedrich was merely a stagy painter of esoteric Christian iconography. If there are only a few splendid Friedrichs from the Soviet Union, this is nonetheless the sort of exhibition whose sum is greater than its parts. But they speak most eloquently in a voice whose calculated imprecision and incompleteness are hallmarks of Romanticism. Friedrich's paintings have often been interpreted strictly as Christian allegories. The invocation of memory helps to endow his work with its mood of loss and longing. He achieves something of the same result through the unreal lighting of the landscape entitled "In Memory of the Riesengebirge." Through such devices Friedrich suggests that his works represent not precisely what is seen but what has been reconstituted from memory. Another is "Window With a View of a Park," a drawing of unknown date that epitomizes Friedrich's exquisite draftsmanship.īoth of these works illustrate the minute distortions of perspective, the ambiguities of space, the curious positioning of the viewer in relation to the images that are typical of the artist. One of these is "On the Sailboat," the painting from around 1818 that depicts a couple, perhaps Friedrich and his wife, perched on the prow of a boat whose billowed sails carry it swiftly toward a distant harbor. The show has been organized jointly with the Art Institute of Chicago, where it was first seen, in exchange for works lent to the Hermitage in Leningrad.Īmong the Soviet works, many bought by the Russian Imperial family, are a couple of paintings and as many drawings that must be considered crucial to the artist's achievement. Half a dozen woodcuts belonging to the Metropolitan and done by the artist's brother, based on Friedrich's designs, supplement the display. "The Romantic Vision of Caspar David Fried rich," at the Metropolitan Museum of Art, through March 31, brings together some 20 paintings and drawings from Soviet collections. Yet there is only one painting by Friedrich in the collection of an American museum, and until now there has never been an exhibition in this country devoted to his work. Friedrich's lonely figures whose backs have been turned toward the viewer, eyes fixed on the abyss, typify the Romantic hero, the solitary man communing with unfathomable nature. The story of landscape in the early 19th century as an art that aspired to the status of grand historical and religious painting could never be told without Friedrich's contribution. No artist embodies more fully than Fried rich the Romantic obsessions with death and mysticism. His austere landscapes are frequently reproduced in books on Romanticism, and neo-Romantic painters liberally borrow from them today.
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Few romantic artists may seem more familiar - and are more elusive - than Caspar David Friedrich.