German Romanticism and Pre-Raphaelite Landscapes

 Asli Akansel

Upon discussing Pre-Raphaelites I could not help but realize a parallel between the Pre-Raphaelite movement and the Sturm und Drang movement in Germany. Sturm und Drang (translated as Storm and Stress) was a brief, proto-Romantic, intellectual movement based in the Germany of later 18^th century. Writers such as Goethe and Schiller are most popular members of this movement. The movement tried to depict the power of nature and feelings over the controlled rationalism much praised by the enlightenment (More on theories of aesthetics of the Storm and Stress movement in Baumgarten’s  Aesthetica or Sulzer’s Worterbuch der Schonen Kunste.). I associated the Sturm und Drang artists with the Pre-Raphaelites not only because both were groups of (almost) all male artists protesting against a set of traditional rules, but also because both movements tried to go back to nature and base their work on experience rather than on abstract rules. In order to show ties between the Pre-Raphaelites and the German art, I have decided to also consider examples from German Romanticism, which followed Storm and Stress. Athough we cannot necessarily describe the German Romantic movement as a unified ideology, I would like to dwell on aspects of the ‘German manner’ that show similarities with the Pre-Raphaelite art. I will compare the two styles’ approach to the subject of landscape.

Romanticism in Germany strove to dissolve of the illusion of harmonious simplicity in paintings. In response to the “protest against medievalism” of the German Aufklarung, the German Romanticists went back to old German art and subject matter. They focused on nature in relation to mankind, and on nature as an escape from industrialized daily life.

            It is not a coincidence that the Pre-Raphaelites resembled German romantic art. Pre-Raphaelites knew about the German artists’ works through prints (for example of Resch). They were also familiar with the subject matter. For example, Rossetti tried to illustrate a Faustian storyline (p.151).  (Mephistopheles listening- plate 79). Similarly, Millais’ Romeo and Juliet version is very similar in its style and arrangement to Resch’s outline drawings of the same subject. Moreover, William Holman Hunt made a statement about how he admired that German romantics went against the prevalent art tradition at their time (William Holman Hunt, vol.1. p.130). Ruskin once argued that Hunt’s The Light of the World looked a lot like P. Veit’s Christus an die Seelenture Klopfand (p.225. John Ruskin pointed out the resemblance in Modern painters III p. 429 in 1824). German art was popular in England at the time, because the Victorians had a taste for didactic and monumental art. We had seen that the Nazarenes, for example were known to have influenced the Pre-Raphaelite with their revival of medieval art.

(From Vaughan, German Romanticism and English Art. 1979)

The landscape paintings of the Pre-Raphaelites and the German Romantics had some common aspects. Both schools rebelled against the proposed set of rules. In England Reynolds led a style that was relatively more generalizing with its Raphael-like contours. Similarly, the style of Claude Lorrain required a shadowy foreground, so that the viewer would be “unobtrusive”. Moreover, the trees and other natural elements would function as coulisses to frame and stage the landscape as in theatre. Landscapes also had to have repoussoirs in shape of roads or water bodies to lead the eye towards the back of the painting (Prettejohn, p.184).

Pre-Raphaelites challenged the hierarchy of representation in their landscape paintings. They did not conform to the artistic rules that required a shift from foreground to background. The extreme detail in every component in the landscape forces the viewers spend more time in front of the painting, as if standing before the landscape itself (Prettejohn, p.178). The distinctive feature of Pre-Raphaelite landscapes was that it involved no suggestions of forms; everything was rendered in truthful form.

The Pre-Raphaelite tradition of working from nature reflects the Erlebniskunst tradition in Germany during the Romantic Movement. Erlebniskunst meant “art from experience”. Rather than abstraction, the artists of German Romantic Movement relied on the concrete experience alone in art and knowledge (Chapter 2 The Aesthetics of Storm and Stress). They thought that the viewer had to be able to relate to the subject matter in order to appreciate the art. Similarly, the Pre-Raphaelites were drawing scenes in an English setting (as in Millais’ The Carpenter Shop). They more or less tried to replicate the models and the setting as is. This scientific study of objects is also essential to Pre-Raphaelite landscape paintings. As Ruskin pointed out “Every Pre-Raphaelite landscape is from the thing itself. Every Pre-Raphaelite figure is a true portrait of the living person.” (Ruskin November. Works, vol 12. P. 157-8 as cited in Prettejohn. Pre-Raphaelites. Tate Publishing. 2007).

For example, John Brett’s Glacier of Rossenlaui 1856 reminded me of Caspar Wolf’s Alpine Studies. Both worked on the same terrain, and both rendered the landscape with outlined, watercolor-like brushwork. Brett depicted the landscape of Rosenlaui without any human figures, focusing on geographical structures (http://www.tate.org.uk/art/artworks/brett-glacier-of-rosenlaui-n05643/text-summary ) (Prettejohn, p.181). Taken as a whole, Brett’s painting conveys the power of nature. It shows us a Sturm und Drang type of nature that overwhelms the viewer. Caspar Wolf (1735-1783), a German romantic painter, made a series of paintings of the Alpine landscape about a century before Brett. Wolf had set out to make studies of the terrain for Abraham Wagner, who was working on encyclopedic recordings of the Alpine landscape. Wolf’s paintings were meant to be true to nature. Nevertheless, they also manage to capture a more sensual side of the nature, making him the perfect example of the Sturm und Drang artist. Wolf did paint figures in the landscape, but the mountains overwhelm the human figures, which is in line with the Sturm und Drang theories. (For paintings of Wolf: http://www.kunstmuseumbasel.ch/en/exhibitions/current/caspar-wolf/ ).

Pre-Raphaelite landscape paintings also reminded me of Caspar David Friedrich’s (1774-1840) landscape paintings. Pre-Raphaelites and Friedrich’s landscapes show similarities in their detail, arrangement, and use of light.

Friedrich’s landscapes were viewed as not fitting the 18^th century customs of landscape paintings because they did not conform to the style of Poussin and Lorrain, containing harmonious arrangements of different plains, and contrasts of light and shadow (Humphries, p.50). Friedrich’s paintings also lack the traditional hierarchy of composition. His Fir Trees in the Snow, from 1828 shows that Friedrich also rendered nature in extreme detail. His paintings were often associated with the Erlebniskunst (painting from experience rather than abstraction) tradition at the time. Friedrich also painted specific locations as in The Watzmann.

However, Friedrich’s painting diverges between the concrete world, and its potential link to the infinite (Koerner, p. 210). His words, “The divine is everywhere even in the grain of sand” (as cited in P.22) shows that in his naturalist depictions were embedded with religious, and almost pantheistic messages. (Koerner, J. Caspar David Friedrich and the Subject of Landscape. 2009. Reaktion Books). He would compose his artwork in a way that would create a symmetrical composition with crossing diagonals (Koerner, p.12). In 1816 Goethe suggested to Friedrich that he make pictorial studies of different types of clouds (Koerner, p.226). Friedrich did make a series of studies, but he was more interested in the heavenly look of the clouds rather than their scientific classification. Friedrich believed that if he copied landscape too precisely he might decrease its ‘higher’ meaning. Here, Friedrich’s style diverges from Pre-Raphaelite hyper-realism.

Pre-Raphaelites did not make simple photographic reproductions of the landscape either. Their paintings also included embedded symbols and messages. For example, Hunt’s Our English Coasts of 1852 was more than a landscape painting with sheep; it included a political message about unprotected coasts (p.177 Prettejohn).

 Friedrich used the twilight shadow extensively in his paintings. A Pre-Raphaelite painter, Wallis, H. used the twilight effect in The Stonebreaker in 1857-8, which was seen as unusual for early the Pre-Raphaelite style (Prettejohn, p.239). Similarly, Millais’ Vale of Rest of 1858 uses the twilight effect.

Sources:

Humphries, L  & Hermitage Amsterdam. Caspar David Friedrich and the German Romantic Landscape. 2008

Koerner, J. Caspar David Friedrich and the Subject of Landscape. 2009. Reaktion Books

Prettejohn, E. Pre-Raphaelites. Tate Publishing. 2007

Ruskin, John. Modern Painters. London: Dent , 1907

Vaughan, German Romanticism and English Art. 1979