Pictures of the Month | October 2009
Picture of the Month
October 2009
Mother and Child by the Sea [1840]
by Johan Christian Dahl
A mother and child wait patiently on a rocky shore for the return of the infant’s father. The child points eagerly to the approaching boat coming into view across the calm sea, aboard which we can see two tiny figures, one of which must be the long-awaited parent. The moon peeks through the darkness and the breaking clouds, its light merging with the last golden moments of sunset to cast a pearlescent shimmer over the sea below.
Norwegian by birth, Johan Christian Dahl spent much of his working life in Dresden, Germany. It was here that he met the native Romantic landscape painter, Caspar David Friedrich, who proved to have a profound influence over Dahl. It can indeed be deduced from this nocturnal seascape, a subject frequently used by both artists. Mother and Child by the Sea recalls in particular the rocky, moonlit beach of Friedrich’s Evening on the Baltic (1826, Georg Schäfer Collection, Schweinfurt). Dahl was also influenced by 17th-century Dutch masters of landscape painting, such as Jacob van Ruisdael (whose Wooded Landscape is part of the Barber collection).
The moon creates a distinct focus-point near the centre of the painting, lighting the way for the father’s return. It has provided constant fascination within mythology and folklore, as well as for artists, storytellers and musicians, often used as a symbol for both love and longing — themes appropriate for this image of family reunion.
Focusing on reunion, Mother and Child by the Sea serves both to commemorate and celebrate Dahl’s family and friends, and can be seen as autobiographical in many ways: his own father was a fisherman, as is the father in the painting. The first version of the work was created in 1830, following the deaths of his second wife and two of his children, his first wife having died only three years previously. This second, revised version was painted within months of the death of his friend and mentor, Friedrich. However, in spite of the tragedies connected with the work, it remains surprisingly optimistic, with the excited gesture of the child and the clouds breaking to reveal the moon, creating a moment of joy where there could so easily have been sadness.
Laura Pitcher, Barber Intern
Chosen by Professor David Eastwood, Vice-Chancellor and Principal, University of Birmingham “When I first saw this I thought, it’s a Caspar David Friedrich that I don’t know. It has a magical combination of light, sea, sails, and people that Friedrich did so evocatively. It has that slightly mournful lyricism of many of his late paintings. It also places women in the position of men, as Friedrich did, sometimes shocking his contemporaries, an in Morning in the Riesengebirge. But, of course, it’s not a Friedrich, but homage to Friedrich, painted in the year of the Master’s death (1840). It stands on its own, with its magical light and its sense of the profundity of a passing moment. It captures a moonlit night that you wish you’d experienced; it hints at the eternal in a moment, and takes us to the heart of the German Romantic imagination.” |
| What is your favourite work of art in the Barber Institute galleries? Drop us a line at info@barber.org.uk and let us know, and we could feature your choice in a future Picture of the Month. |