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Kant in Caspar David Friedrich’s Frames
Author(s) -
Prager Brad
Publication year - 2002
Publication title -
art history
Language(s) - English
Resource type - Journals
SCImago Journal Rank - 0.1
H-Index - 19
eISSN - 1467-8365
pISSN - 0141-6790
DOI - 10.1111/1467-8365.00303
Subject(s) - sublime , argument (complex analysis) , politics , philosophy , painting , art history , epistemology , art , aesthetics , law , political science , biochemistry , chemistry
This essay concerns the applicability of the concepts of the sublime and the beautiful to Caspar David Friedrich’s paintings. It takes the public debate around Friedrich’s Cross in the Mountains (1807–08) as a starting point from which to reflect upon the relationship of this categorical distinction to the apparent contentiousness of his work. Using Kant’s philosophical argument, the essay explores why Friedrich’s formal interventions were not only aesthetic ones, but quite political as well. It then follows its terms into the twentieth century, considering its argument from the perspectives of Derrida and Lyotard, who have each reflected on the interrelationship of politics and sublimity in contemporary contexts.