1774-1840 Caspar David Friedrich Locations German painter, studied art at Copenhagen, and in 1798 settled in Dresden. Friedrich painted chiefly landscapes and seascapes, with and without figures, architectural pictures, including a few of Dresden, and some religious subjects. Religious feeling and symbolism permeate his œuvre, of which the seascape with figures, Die Lebensstufen, is a characteristic example. He possessed considerable power to convey mood in landscape. Almost forgotten in the 19th c. and early 20th c., interest in his work increased considerably in the mid-20th c. He is hardly represented in Britain, but an exhibition of 112 of his pictures at the Tate Gallery in 1972 attracted much attention. F. G. Kersting was a friend of Friedrich.
The Wanderer above the Mists
1817-18 Oil on canvas, 94,8 x 74,8 cm Kunsthalle, Hamburg In this painting Friedrich shows a lonely figure confronting nature in astonished reverence. Friedrich's figures who habitually turn their backs to gaze into the horizon or stare from windows with rapt attention are images of the artist. His Wanderer, frock-coated and stick in hand, has climbed to a rocky peak above swirling mountain mists; the viewer looks with his eyes, the angle of vision being exactly aligned to their level in the picture space. The foreground, the conventional plateau to give the viewer a fix on the subject, has been entirely dispensed with. Listen to Franz Schubert's Wanderer Fantasy, a piano piece composed in the same Romantic spirit as manifested by Friedrich's painting