Monk by the Sea
1808–1810 · Oil on canvas · Alte Nationalgalerie, Staatliche Museen zu Berlin
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About this work
- Artist
- Caspar David Friedrich (1774–1840)
- Year
- 1808–1810
- Medium
- Oil on canvas
- Original size
- 110 × 171.5 cm
- Collection
- Alte Nationalgalerie, Staatliche Museen zu Berlin
- Movement
- Romanticism
A single small figure stands on a low dune before a dark sea and an immense grey sky that takes up most of the canvas. There is no framing tree, no ship, no path: Friedrich originally painted two sailing boats on the horizon and then removed them, leaving a composition more radical than anything in landscape painting of its time. He worked on it in Dresden from 1808 to 1810, changing it repeatedly, and showed it at the Berlin Academy exhibition in 1810 with its pendant The Abbey in the Oakwood hung beneath it. At the wish of the fifteen-year-old crown prince, King Frederick William III of Prussia bought both pictures. They still hang side by side in the Alte Nationalgalerie in Berlin. Friedrich himself described the monk brooding on the unfathomable beyond, and the painting has become a touchstone of Romantic solitude.
This exhibition-poster edition shows the whole work beneath original typography set in-house. The original is in the public domain.
Where it works
A tiny figure under an immense grey sky, the most radical empty picture of its age, for a bedroom, study or minimal living room at 24×36 in black. A pale grey, white or charcoal wall; hang it alone with nothing else on that wall.
- Style
- Exhibition poster of a Romanticism painting
- Era
- 19th century (1808–1810)
- Orientation
- Portrait
- Palette
- cream & beige
- Mood
- dramatic, moody
- Rooms
- living room, dining room, dorm room, hallway or entryway
- Good gift for
- housewarming, art lovers
Size. Prints at 12×18, 16×24, 24×36 in — 12×18 for a shelf, desk or a gallery-wall grid; 16×24 above a desk, console or in a hallway; 24×36 as the statement piece above a sofa or bed.
Framing. Exhibition posters sit best in a slim black frame with no mat — the typeset margin is the mat.
Pairing. Pairs as a set of three with other famous painting prints (10% off three or more).
Details & materials
Shipping & returns
Is this the whole painting, or a crop?
Is Monk by the Sea in the public domain?
What is it printed on?
When was Monk by the Sea painted, and in what medium?
What size works above a sofa or bed?
About this design
The Madten promise
A fine-art print
The same artwork as a clean fine-art print — the image shown large with a minimal caption.
The full-bleed edition
The same plate printed edge-to-edge, filling the whole sheet — bold and immersive.
