Caspar D. Friedrich (visual) and Louis Spohr (audio)

[Left: self portrait of Spohr
Right: self portrait of C.F. David]

In this edition of Duo we will travel to a time when art wasn't simply for shocking people and marketing, in that period an artist was somehow above (and occasionally misunderstood by) the rest. The best of them being perceived as geniuses struggling more or less in the world, tormented by their emotions, their creativity, their intelligence. Romanticism (the history of which I will address with another occasion) was mostly a north European phenomenon at its birth, and generally a reaction to the Age of Enlightenment and the Industrial Revolution. The day Caspar David Friedrich was born is the day in which the First Continental Congress was held, 5 September 1774.*

Our second artist is Louis (Ludwig) Spohr (1784 - 1859), a German composer, violinist and conductor very underrated in present times but who enjoyed great popularity in his period. Search the web and your local library/bookshop for their biographies if you want to learn more.

For the audio segment I selected Violin Concerto No.7 in E minor (Op38), played by the Bratislava Philharmonic Chamber Orchestra, conducted by Libor Pesek and violin solo by Takako Nishizaki. Now, click play and look carefully at all the works here, travel inside the world Friedrich tried to share with us, let your imagination flow, your mind wander.

1810 - Abbey in the oakwood

1815 - View of a Harbour

1818 - The Wanderer

1821 - Moonrise by Sea

1822 - Midday

1822 - Woman at the Window

1823 - Sea of Ice

1830 - Two men contemplating the Moon - Metropolitan Museum of Art

1835 - Periods of Life

1835 - The Dreamer - State Hermitage Museum

* - The two events are evidently not related yet I symbolically present them as two important moments in art and world history respectively.