Diploma Lecture Series 2013 Revolution to Romanticism: European Art and Culture 1750-1850 Caspar David Friedrich and the art of the sublime Dr Jacqueline Strecker 17/18 July 2013 Lecture summary: Caspar David Friedrich is recognised as one of the great landscape painters of the romantic era and revolutionised traditional concepts of landscape painting through his visionary imagination and radically new and inventive techniques. I’d like to approach the sublime in Friedrich’s art as having the effect of overwhelming the viewer, of creating a sense of awe as we confront the wonder- inducing monumentality or incredible simplicity of the subject. With Friedrich, as we will discover, there are other factors at play such as spiritual transcendence but ultimately his works are exceptionally crafted. It’s important to consider both the materiality of his paintings and the ways in which his landscapes are brilliant illusions that create powerful emotional responses in the viewer that resonate strongly in the work of contemporary artists such as Gerhard Richter. Slide list: All works are by Caspar David Friedrich unless otherwise noted *Monk by the sea, 1809, oil on canvas, Nationalgalerie, Berlin Georg Friedrich Kersting, Caspar David Friedrich in his studio, 1812, oil on canvas, Nationalgalerie, Berlin Scudding clouds, c.1820, oil on canvas, Hamburger Kunsthalle, Hamburg Dolmen in the snow, 1807, oil on canvas, Galerie Neue Meister, Staatliche Kunstsammlungen Dresden *The cross in the mountains (Tetschen Altar), 1808, oil on canvas, Galerie Neue Meister, Staatliche Kunstsammlungen Dresden Winter landscape, 1811, oil on canvas, National Gallery London *The wanderer above the mists, c.1817-18, oil on canvas, Hamburger Kunsthalle, Hamburg Carl Gustav Carus, Wanderer on the mountaintop, 1818, oil on canvas, Saint Louis Art Museum, Missouri Chalk cliffs at Rügen, 1818, oil on canvas, Stiftung Oskar Reinhart, Winterthur, Switzerland Proudly sponsored by Slide list continued Woman at a window, 1822, oil on canvas, Nationalgalerie, Berlin *Sea of ice, 1823-24, oil on canvas, Hamburger Kunsthalle, Hamburg Moonrise on the seashore, 1822, oil on canvas, Nationalgalerie, Berlin *Two men observing the moon, 1830, oil on canvas, private collection, Hamburg Easter morning, 1833, oil on canvas, Museo Thyssen-Bornemisza, Madrid Mountains in the rising fog, c.1835, oil on canvas, Städel Museum, Frankfurt am Main References: David Blayney Brown, Romanticism, Phaidon, London, 2001 Keith Hartley, ed., The romantic spirit in German art 1790-1990, exh cat, Scottish National Gallery of Modern Art, Edinburgh, 28 July – 7 September 1994 Werner Hofmann, Caspar David Friedrich, Thames and Hudson, London, 2000 Hugh Honour, Romanticism, Pelican, London, 1979 Joseph Leo Koerner, Caspar David Friedrich and the subject of landscape, Reaktion, London, 1990 Wieland Schmied, Caspar David Friedrich, Harry N. Abrams, Inc., New York, 1995 William Vaughan, German romantic painting, Yale University Press, New Haven and London, 1980 Caspar David Friedrich, Monk by the sea, 1809, oil on canvas, Nationalgalerie, Berlin Caspar David Friedrich The cross in the mountains (Tetschen Altar) 1808 Galerie Neue Meister, Staatliche Kunstsammlungen, Dresden Caspar David Friedrich The wanderer above the mists c.1817-18 Hamburger Kunsthalle, Hamburg Caspar David Friedrich Sea of ice c1823-24 Hamburger Kunsthalle, Hamburg Caspar David Friedrich Two men observing the moon 1830 Private collection, Hamburg .