"The Arctic Ocean" is one of Caspar David Friedrich's most famous paintings. Broken, brown, green and yellow appearing ice sheets have pushed together and form a jagged, triangular structure that inevitably attracts the viewer's gaze. Only late does he notice that something else is hiding in the ice: an accidental sailing ship. Only the decorated tail is clearly visible, somewhere fused also the mast and a part of a sail in color with the ice. The section of the picture is well chosen. The observer thinks that he is standing in front of the staircase-like ice plates. The brown color scheme gives the impression of a solid, not at all fragile, crystalline material that one normally imagines ice cream. His power is thereby emphasized.

On the one hand, the picture looks desolate. It shows the tremendous power of nature against which man has no chance. This theme is often found in Friedrich's pictures. But there is also enough color in the picture, so that "Eismeer" does not look gloomy at all. On the contrary. The masterful composition directs the gaze from the heavy, brown lower part upwards, where it gets brighter, the ice shimmers almost transparent bluish, until it reaches the top, where in the sky the cloud cover is torn open and a Hope giving blue shows.

It is assumed that the painting has a historical background. In the years 1819/20 an expedition took place, during which the northwest passage between the Atlantic and the Pacific was to be found. It was neither the first nor the last attempt, and so far all had failed. So did the expedition William Edward Parry, which served as inspiration for the painting. The situation was that one of the ships was pushed against the land by the ice floes and nearly capsized. Friedrich was pretty sure he knew the travelogue and a copper engraving of the near miss. He did not simply copy the illustrations, but continued them.

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The Ice Sea by Caspar David Friedrich. Available as an art print on canvas, photo paper, watercolor board, uncoated paper or Japanese paper.
depression · cold · floe · expedition · history · hope · refrigeration · psychology · restauration · shipwreck · shipwreck · marine · symbolism · winter · geography · germany · eismeer · north pole · technology · painting · painting · Hamburg, Kunsthalle / akg-images