Dr. Petra Kuhlmann-Hodick and PD Dr. Johannes Rößler, who co-edited the publication alongside Prof. Dr. Johannes Grave for the C.H.Beck publishing house, will present it for the first time in our exhibition space. The book contains all known letters and writings by the artist and — for the first time — their detailed annotations.

Although Caspar David Friedrich is known worldwide as an artist, he is yet to be discovered as an author of a wide variety of text genres, including letters, writings on art and poetry. This volume is the first to present all of the artist's known letters and writings and provides a detailed commentary on them. Over a hundred letters from various phases of his life document the sophisticated intellectual environment in which his paintings were created. Diary-like entries, aphoristic notes and poems also provide insights into the painter's inner world. One extensive manuscript in particular, the Statements made when viewing a collection of paintings (Äußerungen bei Betrachtung einer Sammlung von Gemälden), opens up perspectives on his paintings, which today stand as symbols of German Romanticism.

The publication, edited by Johannes Grave, Petra Kuhlmann-Hodick and Johannes Rößler, creates a reliable basis for a reassessment of Friedrich's texts and places them in relation to his artistic work. The two co-editors Petra Kuhlmann-Hodick and Johannes Rößler will not only offer an insight into the new findings, but will also report on their exciting work on the edition. For example, material-technological examinations of the paper and inks have provided new insights into Friedrich's writing practice.

Dr. Petra Kuhlmann-Hodick directed, among other things, the material-technological investigations of Friedrich's most important manuscript Statements made when viewing a collection of paintings. She is head curator at the Graphic Cabinet of the State Art Collection of Dresden and has curated numerous exhibitions there, including Carl Gustav Carus, Nature and Idea, Dahl und Friedrich. Romantic Landscapes and most recently Caspar David Friedrich. Where it all began.

PD Dr. Johannes Rößler compiled the text corpus and annotated large parts of the volume. As a member of staff at the Chair of Modern Art History at Friedrich Schiller University Jena, his research interests include Romantic art and image-text relationships. He curated the current exhibition Caspar David Friedrich - Found in Translation at the Hegenbarth Collection in Berlin, and co-curated the exhibition Caspar David Friedrich, Goethe and Romanticism in Weimar, which opens at the Klassik Stiftung Weimar on November 21.

Due to limited capacities, please RSVP at:

030 23 60 99 99
kunstvermittlung@herr-hegenbarth-berlin.de

Admission is free.