Caspar David Friedrich

Wanderer Above the Sea of Fog — German Romantic landscape

The painter of the sublime. His solitary figures — backs turned to us, gazing into fog, sea, or mountain vastness — are the visual definition of Romantic longing. The Wanderer Above the Sea of Fog is the most iconic image of Romanticism. Forgotten after his death, he was rediscovered by the Surrealists and the Existentialists.

Key works

• Wanderer Above the Sea of Fog~1818— The icon of Romantic solitude
  Hamburger Kunsthalle, Hamburg
• The Sea of Ice1824— A shipwreck crushed by polar ice — nature's indifference
  Hamburger Kunsthalle, Hamburg
• Monk by the Sea1810— One figure, vast sky — the sublime reduced to essentials
  Alte Nationalgalerie, Berlin

Connections

External