Caspar David Friedrich
Der Mönch am Meer
1808-1810
oil
on canvas
110
x 171,5 cm
Alte
Nationalgalerie, Berlin
Looking at the paintings of
Caspar David Friedrich I see atmosphere and structure. The Monk by the Sea (Der
Mönch am Meer 1808-1810) is probably his most radical piece of work. This
painting shows an overwhelming emptiness with the weight of the whole cosmos.
More than just a landscape it shows nature in its most comprehensive form.
Nature and its experience by the lonely figure in the foreground, of whom I
can’t really tell whether he’s a part of it or not.
Although it’s known that
Friedrich painted his images rather quick and accurate after looking a long
time at the empty canvas, in this picture you can still see the traces of two
small fishing boats in the horizon which were eventually painted over. With
this correction he brings pure abstraction suddenly very close by.
For myself the works of
Friedrich were one of the reasons to focus on landscape drawings. The one shown
here is the first of a series of drawings in large format. In this drawing
there’s a lot of trial and error, several systems are visible next to each
other. The only part uncorrected is the foreground which is, just like you see
often in Friedrich’s paintings, clearly distinct from the background. Yet
together they produce the landscape.
Bas
Ketelaars, 2017
Bas Ketelaars
Untitled (searching C.D.#1)
2013
graphite
on paper
150
x 170 cm
collection
AMC
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