Friedrich was a romanticist. Romanticism revolved around the importance of feelings, imagination, self-expression and individual creativity. The Romantic Movement, which began around 1795, brought about one of the most fundamental changes in outlook in literature, music and the arts. It’s originated in the second half of the 18th century in Western Europé and evolved during the Industrial Revolution.
Friedrich’s landscapes are based on places in Germany, including mountains, trees, morning mists and many more. One of his most famous paintings is called “Wanderer above the mist”. It shows a young wanderer standing on a rock facing the sea with his back towards the viewer. He is wearing a dark green overcoat and is holding a stick in his right hand. The wind is blowing through his hair and above there is a hazy sky and a few rocks are sticking out of the sea. On one rock there is a small forest and water is almost eating the giant rocks.
I think the painting matches the rest of his paintings. It’s conveying self-reflection through a wanderer’s eyes. The wanderer is shown glued to the darkness and the haziness of the sea of fog. In a way, the wanderer is giving a hint of how Friedrich was as a person. How he sees the world. The painting is dark just like many of his other paintings which show that he was probably unhappy, grey and stiff.
His paintings are easy to recognize; he is famous for the magical light that seems to shine in the paintings. In many paintings there is a figure in the foreground, with its back turned to the viewer. The figures are small; they are considering the view, and give us the feeling of doing the same. The views of his landscapes are enchanted, it's unreachable and merciless, and also inspires. He made sketches from life, but often mixed scenes from completely different locations when he completed his paintings.
Deep in his paintings lies a spirit or dream. The nature has an extreme likeness to the real world. A good description I would give his paintings would be: “dreams beyond the human mind”.
