Inaug.-Diss. --Munich. / Bibliography: p. 102-103.

Uppsatsen undersöker hur konstnärerna Caspar David Friedrich och Marcus Larson kan ha influerats av epoken romantiken i deras konst samt att den undersöker om deras bildkonst kan kopplas till den gotiska litteraturens tematik.

Thesis (Ph.D.)--University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign, 2006. / Source: Dissertation Abstracts International, Volume: 67-11, Section: A, page: 4030. Adviser: William Kinderman. Includes bibliographical references (leaves 261-272) Available on microfilm from Pro Quest Information and Learning.

La peinture de Caspar David Friedrich (1774-1840), connue pour être une peinture« métaphysique », ayant une forte charge symbolique, donne lieu à toutes sortes déconstructions idéologiques. Notre travail propose une réflexion, au travers de cet art et de ses interprétations, sur la notion même de « romantisme ». Il s’agit de montrer qu’un examen précis de la représentation que le romantisme allemand a de lui-même offre des possibilités herméneutiques encore en partie inédites pour qui veut comprendre Friedrich en tant que peintre romantique allemand. C’est ce que nous avons tâché de faire apparaître dans une approche philosophique qui associe présence au tableau comme objet capable de produire lui-même son sens, inscription dans le contexte des pensées contemporaines de cet art, et examen des résonances de ce romantisme dans l’art d’aujourd’hui. Recentrant l’interprétation du romantisme allemand sur la pensée de Novalis, nous avons pris pour fil conducteur la formulation du programme explicite de ce que lui-même dénomme la« philosophie romantique » dans un fragment célèbre (« Le monde doit être romantisé.C’est ainsi que l’on retrouvera le sens originel ») et qui fait du romantisme un concept opératoire, une opération ou technique — un « art de ». L’enjeu de cette thèse est de clarifier ainsi le sens philosophique de l’exigence romantique allemande, à entendre comme un idéal esthétique, donc comme un concept normatif, tout en cherchant à explorer dans la philosophie romantique de l’art le thème à nos yeux négligé de la peinture comme art visuel. A ce titre, elle n’est pas une monographie sur Friedrich, elle interroge, par son prisme, la philosophie romantique. / The painting of Caspar David Friedrich (1774-1840), known for being ‘metaphysical’ andstrongly charged with symbolism, has given rise to all sorts of ideological constructions.Based on this art and its manifold interpretations our study reflects on the very notion of‘romanticism’. It seeks to demonstrate that a precise examination of the representation that romanticism has of itself offers hermeneutic possibilities that still remain partially unexplored for anyone wishing to understand Friedrich as a German romantic painter. Our philosophical approach endeavours to pay close attention to the paintings as objects capable of producing their own meaning, as well as situating this art in the context of contemporary ideas and conceptions, and analyzing the resonances of this romanticism inthe art of today. Re-focusing the interpretation of German romanticism onto the thought of Novalis we have adopted as a guiding thought the formulation of a programme that explicitly terms itself “romantic philosophy” in a celebrated fragment (“The world must be romanticized. In this way one finds again its original meaning”), and which renders romanticism an operational concept, an operation, technique or method – an “art of”.Thus, the aim of this thesis is to clarify the philosophical sense of the romantic imperative,understood as an aesthetic ideal, i.e. as a normative concept, while seeking to explore inthe romantic philosophy of art the hit her to neglected topic of painting as a visual art.Accordingly, this work is not a monograph on Friedrich. Rather, through the prism of his art it questions the status and nature of romantic philosophy itself.

The Lofoten Maelström in Norway, one of the world’s most powerful systems of tidal eddies, has been a locus of terror and imagination for centuries. First depicted in renaissance cartography, the myth of the vortex was propagated through the occult science of Athanasius Kircher and found its most current expression in Edgar Allan Poe’s “A Descent into the Maelström”. This thesis is a work of exegesis. That is, a work of interpretation that leads out of a text, or a site, towards another level of meaning. Poe’s text refers to the geographic site of the thesis but also becomes a site in itself. It is out of this text/site that the author unfolds a series of exegetical pathways, constructing an ambiguous ground between the real and imaginary dimensions of the Maelström. This thesis is also a work of synthesis. It explores how the speculative architectural proposition can crystallize subtle conceptual material in ways that text and image alone cannot. While the thesis is heavily invested in various modes of representation, architectural and otherwise, it also acts as a critical investigation into the nature of representation itself. The document is composed as a performance in three parts. Each part broadly engages a fundamental binary that is latent in the work of architecture: 1) history and fiction 2) figure and ground 3) ritual and design. Part I introduces the site through various historical and fictional portrayals of the Maelström which have contributed to the co-authorship of its mythologized identity. Part II consists of a suite of three discursive essays that address the sublime, the death instinct, romanticism, negative theology, the chora, and 20th century performance theory. This material is organized under the umbrella of three figure/ground conditions: the figure against the sublime ground of the romantic-era painting, the negative ground of medieval mysticism, and the ritual ground of the Greek chorus and its spatial counterpart, the chora. Finally, Part III includes two movements: the design of a wave energy research facility, and a series of episodic vignettes that subvert the intentions of the designer by re-casting the facility as a place of ritual. With the Maelström as a backdrop, the architectural proposition offers itself as the stage upon which this struggle between design and ritual is enacted.

The Lofoten Maelström in Norway, one of the world’s most powerful systems of tidal eddies, has been a locus of terror and imagination for centuries. First depicted in renaissance cartography, the myth of the vortex was propagated through the occult science of Athanasius Kircher and found its most current expression in Edgar Allan Poe’s “A Descent into the Maelström”. This thesis is a work of exegesis. That is, a work of interpretation that leads out of a text, or a site, towards another level of meaning. Poe’s text refers to the geographic site of the thesis but also becomes a site in itself. It is out of this text/site that the author unfolds a series of exegetical pathways, constructing an ambiguous ground between the real and imaginary dimensions of the Maelström. This thesis is also a work of synthesis. It explores how the speculative architectural proposition can crystallize subtle conceptual material in ways that text and image alone cannot. While the thesis is heavily invested in various modes of representation, architectural and otherwise, it also acts as a critical investigation into the nature of representation itself. The document is composed as a performance in three parts. Each part broadly engages a fundamental binary that is latent in the work of architecture: 1) history and fiction 2) figure and ground 3) ritual and design. Part I introduces the site through various historical and fictional portrayals of the Maelström which have contributed to the co-authorship of its mythologized identity. Part II consists of a suite of three discursive essays that address the sublime, the death instinct, romanticism, negative theology, the chora, and 20th century performance theory. This material is organized under the umbrella of three figure/ground conditions: the figure against the sublime ground of the romantic-era painting, the negative ground of medieval mysticism, and the ritual ground of the Greek chorus and its spatial counterpart, the chora. Finally, Part III includes two movements: the design of a wave energy research facility, and a series of episodic vignettes that subvert the intentions of the designer by re-casting the facility as a place of ritual. With the Maelström as a backdrop, the architectural proposition offers itself as the stage upon which this struggle between design and ritual is enacted.

This Master’s thesis shall attempt to reconcile the notion of the spiritual with that of the aesthetic by focusing on the influence of 16th century German mystic Jakob Böhme, with the 19th century cultural movement of German Romanticism. Böhme’s mysticism outlined a spiritual paradigm that fused alchemy with Christianity wherein the properties of nature are inherently led by a spiritual desire towards unity with God. It is through the process of spiritual desire that unity unveils itself. Consequently, Böhme’s mysticism influenced later generations of spiritual thought, including German Romanticism. Within Romanticism, Friedrich von Hardenberg, know by his pen name Novalis, developed a philosophy and aesthetic theory that expanded away from the philosophical ideas of the Enlightenment. This new philosophy focused on the subjective experience and how revelation of the self was to be experienced through creative introspection, as a consequence of encountering and interacting with the other. Novalis‘ philosophy incorpterated religious motifs and spirituality to assert that it was through creative striving that spiritual revelation was to be achieved from within oneself. Caspar David Friedrich was a Romantic landscape painter whose work focused on the notion of humanity in the face of nature. Friedrich often painted landscapes as an allegory for Christian values and religious inquiry that becomes an existential introspection through nature. Through comparative analysis I shall demonstrate how the ideas and works of Novalis and Caspar David Friedrich correlate with the spiritual mysticism of Böhme that represent the greater discourse that is spirituality itself. / Graduate / 2021-04-24

Am 11. September des Jahres 1830 notierte der Maler Caspar David Friedrich: „Ich lebe nun seit einigen dreißig Jahren in Dresden, aber noch nie habe ich so viele freudige Gesichter gesehen als gestern.“

Am 11. September des Jahres 1830 notierte der Maler Caspar David Friedrich: „Ich lebe nun seit einigen dreißig Jahren in Dresden, aber noch nie habe ich so viele freudige Gesichter gesehen als gestern.“

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