Friedrich is perhaps the truest Romantic among landscape painters. This study discusses in detail 68 chosen works, elucidating their artistic qualities and guiding the reader toward a fuller understanding of their symbolic content. An essay on Friedrich's life and work serves as an introduction.

"The eighty-four masterpieces illustrated in this volume provide a unique overview of the works held in the Museum of Fine Arts, Leipzig. The most important German artists of the period are represented here, including Philipp Otto Runge, Caspar David Friedrich, Carl Gustav Carus, Carl Blechen, Max Klinger, Wilhelm Leibl, Adolf von Menzel, Fritz von Uhde, Max Liebermann, and Lovis Corinth. Their works underline the principle movements and developments, as well as the radical changes experienced in a century of change."--BOOK JACKET.Title Summary field provided by Blackwell North America, Inc. All Rights Reserved

"Works of the German romantic painter who is best known for his later allegorical landscapes, which feature contemplative figures silhouetted against night skies, morning mists, barren trees, and Gothic ruins."--Caspardavidfriedrich.org.

Text in English and German. When Kari Friedrich Schinkel finally realised his long-held wish to design stage sets in 1815 under the new director general of the Royal Theatres in Berlin, Karl Count of Bruhl, this introduced a new epoch in the field of stage design. It opened with the twelve sets for Mozart's Magic Flute. These are still living masterpieces in which two geniuses who are related by nature meet. The aim of Schinkel's efforts was to create a comprehensively educational Gesamtkunstwerk. The designs for Mozart's opera were followed by settings from stage works by Gluck, Schiller and Kleist, and also some by authors who are now less well known or forgotten. Schinkel's success created a desire for reproductions of his most beautiful designs. They appeared as coloured aquatint etchings by excellent Berlin engravers from 1819 to 1824 in five volumes, a total of 30 sheets, to which two more were added in a second edition produced from 1847 to 1849. Two further editions were produced in 1861 and in 1874, which proves the continuing popularity of the works. One consequence of the reproductions was that Schinkel's ideas spread beyond the confines of Berlin.The textual commentary examines Schinkel's relationship with the stage, which changed in the course of his life, the history of the emergence of the reproduced works and the strategies pursued by his publisher Ludwig Wilhelm Wittich. Count Bruhl's prefaces to the first and last volumes are important documents in Berlin's theatrical history. A catalogue provides explanations about how the designs were used, on contemporary judgements of them and on their artistic significance.

Schinkel reiste zweimal nach Italien. Einmal als junger Mann und einmal als bereits reifer Künstler. Die Italienreisen von 1803 bis 1805 und 1824 waren nicht nur für seinen Werdegang als Künstler von kaum zu überschätzender Bedeutung, sie haben das ganze Kunstleben Berlins befruchtet und dem preußischen Klassizismus eine spezifische Heiterkeit mitgeteilt. In diesem Band werden seine im "klassischen Land" entstandenen Skizzen und Aufzeichnungen ausführlich dokumentiert und kommentiert. Während die erste Reise des sich entfaltenden Genies durch Schriftzeugnisse nur unvollständig dokumentiert ist, unterrichtet ein kontinuierlich geführtes Tagebuch nahezu lückenlos über die zweite Reise des nun schon berühmten Architekten. Diese schriftlichen Dokumente sind hier erstmals wortgetreu einschließlich der Korrekturen und in originaler Schreibweise wiedergegeben sowie ausführlich kommentiert und ergänzt durch bisher unveröffentlichte Quellen. Die Reifung eines großen Künstlers in 20 Jahren lässt sich in Urteilen, in der Wahrnehmung und im Stil der Formulierungen eindrucksvoll nachvollziehen. Durch die Fülle von bedeutenden Zeichnungen - abgebildet sind fast alle der rund 750 Einzelblätter und Studien in Skizzenbüchern - wird das Erlebnis vor allem der ersten Reise veranschaulicht.