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Wanderer above the Sea of Fog
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| Wanderer above the Mist |
| Caspar David Friedrich, 1818 |
| Oil-on-canvas |
| 94.8 × 74.8 cm |
| Kunsthalle, Hamburg |
Wanderer above the Sea of Fog (also known as Wanderer Above the Mist) is an 1818 oil-on-canvas painting by the German Romantic artist Caspar David Friedrich.
The work depicts a man, Friedrich himself,[1] standing atop a high mountain, before a great mass of fog. Peaks of other mountains can be seen above the surface of the fog, while a range of huge mountains can be seen in the background. The large expanse of sky above the heights of the mountains in the background covers much of the painting.
Analysis
This painting is very true to the romantic style. It depicts a man standing on top of a mountain, with his back to the painter, gazing down into a sea of fog. At first glimpse it looks like a mere landscape, but with a closer analysis we see that it makes a powerful statement about mankind and personal enlightenment. The audience should first notice the man's strange clothes. Although he is on top of a lofty mountain he is wearing a formal outfit that would have been typical of a philosopher during Friedrich's life. He is looking down from his perch at a huge mass of grey fog. This is a symbol of the world and it's general inhabitants. It is a powerful statement of the difficulty and loneliness of the intellectually advanced. The man represents the few individuals in the world that are free from the shapeless mass that is society. This is typical of the romantic period. It was a time when the industrial revolution was in full stride and people tried to get away from machinery and the pain and poverty that they brought with them. It was popular to try get away from the evil of society and back into the purity and majesty of nature. This is a powerful piece with depth and great detail. This piece can also represent mankind reaching for their goals and acknowledging their feats by standing above all things, representing his triumph over the struggles that life has to offer and in the end realizing that the struggle was worth it.
Friedrich's interest in nature is clearly evidenced in many of his other works. Examples include his Chalk Cliffs on Rügen, painted in 1818, which portrays a man standing, and a woman seated, looking out, while another man on his hands and knees looks over the ledge of a vast and high-reaching slope leading down to an endless ocean. Another example of this can be found in Friedrich's The Sea of Ice, which depicts, in the foreground, a large mass of ruins, and, in the middle and background, similar piles of ruins, numerous in number, littering what appears to be a frozen, icy landscape.
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