Art Institute of ChicagoPublic domain

Statue of the Madonna in the Mountains

Caspar David Friedrich · 1804

Analyst brief

What the record supports

"Statue of the Madonna in the Mountains" is a work by Caspar David Friedrich, created in 1804. This piece is a drawing, executed with brush and black ink and gray wash, with graphite, on cream wove paper. It measures 24.4 × 38.2 cm (9 5/8 × 15 1/16 in.) and is classified as an ink or chalk wash. The artwork is part of the Prints and Drawings department and was acquired through the Margaret Day Blake Collection, representing German culture.

The provenance details indicate the drawing was held by Carl August Wuppesahl (1873-1954) in Bremen by 1936. It was sold by Auctionhouse Dörling, Hamburg, to Walter Feilchenfeldt, Zürich, in 1975, and subsequently sold to The Art Institute of Chicago in 1976. This artwork has been featured in several exhibitions, including "Ein Halbjahrtausend deutscher Zeichnung" in Bremen (1936), "Caspar David Friedrich 1774-1840" in Hamburg (1974), and "Great Drawings from The Art Institute of Chicago" (1985), and is scheduled for "Caspar David Friedrich: The Soul of Nature" at The Metropolitan Museum of Art in 2025.

The work has been documented in various publications, including Helmut Börsch-Supan and Karl Wilhelm Jähnig's 1973 catalogue raisonné of Friedrich's works, and has been featured in The Art Institute of Chicago's own publications and exhibition catalogues. No auction prices or further attribution details beyond the catalogue entry are provided in the supplied data.

Generated from the catalogue fields shown on this page. Nartmad does not assert attributions, valuations or prices that no cited source supports.

Provenance

Ownership history

Carl August Wuppesahl (1873-1954), Bremen, by 1936 [Bremen 1936 and Börsch-Supan and Jähnig 1973]. Sold by Auctionhouse Dörling, Hamburg, to Walter Feilchenfeldt, Zürich, 1975 [a letter from Walter Feilchenfeldt of January 5, 2004 in curatorial file]; sold to the Art Institute, 1976.

Recorded by Art Institute of Chicago.

Exhibitions

Exhibition history

Bremen, Germany, Kunsthalle Bremen, "Ein Halbjahrtausend deutscher Zeichnung," June 9-August 30, 1936, cat. 78.
Wiesbaden, Germany, Städtisches Museum Wiesbaden, "Zeichenkunst in der deutschen Romantik," May-July 1937, cat. 81; also traveled to the Nassauischer Kunstverein Wiesbaden.
Hamburg, Germany, Hamburg Kunsthalle, "Caspar David Friedrich 1774-1840," September 14-November 3, 1974, cat. 56, cat by Werner Hofmann, et al..
The Art Institute of Chicago, "Great Drawings from The Art Institute of Chicago: The Harold Joachim Years 1958-1983," July 24-September 30, 1985, pp. 120-21, cat. 53 (ill.), cat. by Martha Tedeschi; also traveled to the St. Louis Museum of Art, March 10-May 17, 1986.
The Metropolitan Museum of Art, New York City, "Caspar David Friedrich: The Soul of Nature", February 3 - May 11, 2025, p. 80, 130, 134-135 (ill.), cat. 16, cat. by Alison Hokanson, Joanna Sheers Seidenstein, et. al.

Literature

Published references

Helmut Bösch-Supan and Karl Wilhelm Jähnig, Caspar David Friedrich: Genälde, Druckgraphik und bildmäßige Zeichnungen (Munich, 1973), pp. 280-81, no. 119 (ill.).
Harold Joachim, "A Drawing by Caspar David Friedrich," Bulletin of The Art Institute of Chicago 70:5 (September-October 1976), pp. 18-19 (ill.).
James N. Wood and Sally Ruth May, The Art Institute of Chicago: The Essential Guide (Chicago, 1993), p. 212 (ill.).
Treasures from The Art Institute of Chicago, selected by James N. Wood, with commentaries by Debra N. Mancoff (Chicago, 2000), p. 184 (ill.).
Marsha Morton, “German Romanticism: The Search for ‘A Quiet Place,’“ The Art Institute of Chicago Museum Studies 28:1 (2002), pp. 11-12 and 16, fig. 5 (ill.).
The Essential Guide (Chicago, 2009), p. 300 (ill.).
Christina Grummt, Caspar David Friedrich, The Complete Drawings (Munich, 2011), p. 398, fig 414 (ill).

Comparables