Caspar David Friedrich

Possibly, Prinz Wilhelm and Marianne von Hessen-Homburg, Berliner Stadtschloss
Acquired circa 1900 by the family of the present owners; thence by descent

Helmut Börsch-Supan & Karl Wilhelm Jähning, Caspar David Friedrich. Gemälde, Druckgrafik und bildmässige Zeichnungen, Munich, 1973, no. 129, p. 285, catalogued & illustrated

The following condition report has been prepared by Jane Mcausland FIIC, Nether Hall Barn, Suffolk IP14 4PP: Support The artist has used a sheet of wove-type paper, which is at present laid onto a thin card, probably contemporary with the artist. Overall the sheet is slightly time stained and shows a little light mottling in places. There is a little surface dirt. Both lower corners are supported on the verso. The sheet shows a small scratch at the foot to the right and other small blemishes. Medium The watercolour wash has faded a bit over the years, this is evident from the area of darker wash running along the foot which has been covered by a mount, away from the light. There is an angled line running across the bank to the left of the boat in the foreground and another two disturbances to the wash in the lower left-hand quadrant. In my opinion these could very well be the artist's corrections. There are darker areas of wash where there is some re-touching in a darker tone at the foot edge to the left and right. Note: This work was viewed outside studio conditions.
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Executed circa 1803, this is one of seven drawings of varying size and detail (Börsch Supan nos. 94, 95, 96, 97, 98, 128, and 129) Friedrich worked up from an ink sketch he made on the beach at Vitt on the island of Rügen on Germany's Baltic coast on 22 June 1801 (fig. 1). The sketch is now in the Dresdner Kupferstich Kabinett. The present view looks north towards Kap Arkona, the island's northern cape. Friedrich returned to the subject of a beached boat surrounded by rocks, a symbol of the completion of life's journey, in 1837, in an ink drawing now in the Hermitage in St Petersburg.

A watercolour by Carl Beckmann of Prinz Wilhelm and Marianne von Hessen-Homburg's apartment in the Berliner Stadtschloss, made shortly after their wedding in 1804, clearly shows four drawings of Rügen by Friedrich adorning their bedroom. Judging by the size of the room it appears that the drawings were approximately the same size as the present work, leading Helmut Börsch-Supan to surmise that the present drawing might be one of the four that hung in the Stadtschloss until Prince Wilhelm's death in 1851. Rügen's dramatic coast went on to inspire one of Friedrich's most iconic paintings, Chalk Cliffs of Rügen of 1818 (Oskar Reinhart Museum, Winterthur).