May 2, 2011 Issue

In this week’s issue, Peter Schjeldahl proposes an interesting alternative to the Metropolitan Museum’s interpretation of Caspar David Friedrich’s two exquisite “window” drawings, “View from the Artist’s Studio, Window on the Right” (ca. 1805-06) and “View from the Artist’s Studio Window on the Left” (ca. 1805-06). On its website, the Met says, “Juxtaposing near and far, the window is a metaphor for unfulfilled longing.” Schjeldahl, in his “Inside Story,” says, “the notion of longing reduces the complexity of Friedrich.” He senses “Something painful about the drawings – a whiff of latent, even delicate, terror.” He suggests that what the drawings convey is “a sense of external reality that is not other to the self but, rather, otherizing.” What does Schjeldahl mean by that? He offers three examples: Kafka, Hopper, and Robert Frank. We know that for Kafka life was scarcely endurable. His ideal room would be windowless. In a letter to Felice, he says, “I have often thought that the best mode of life for me would be to sit in the innermost room of a spacious locked cellar with my writing things and a lamp….” As for Hopper, his windows are filled with light and life. In contrast, the barrenness of his rooms suggest imprisonment (see, for example, “Rooms by the Sea,” and “Sun in an Empty Room”). How is it that Robert Frank is relevant? Schjeldahl says, “Take Robert Frank’s classic, devastating shot of gauzy curtains blowing in a window that overlooks a grimy mining town: the good news of beauty laced with the bad news of being stuck in Butte, Montana.” But the windows in Friedrich’s drawings look out on ships floating on the placid Elbe. I don’t see how Frank’s hellish picture is pertinent. So I’m going to say, with the greatest respect, that Schjeldahl’s “otherizing” interpretation, while endlessly stimulating, seems off the mark. I think the Met got it right: Friedrich’s two great “window” drawings are “a metaphor for unfulfilled longing.”

Postscript: I should add that Schjeldahl’s review contains my favorite passage in this week’s New Yorker. It’s a description of Friedrich’s “Woman at the Window”: “She is seen from behind in a dusky, greenish interior: hair done up, wearing a high-waisted dress that is described, with gorgeous economy, by a few fast strokes of turquoise, for the pleats in it, on a sketchy brownish ground.” That “few fast strokes of turquoise” is wonderful.

Second Thoughts: But I wonder if we do an injustice to these wonderful drawings by reducing them to metaphor. In seeking Friedrich’s meaning, are we missing out on savoring his art? Is it too simplistic to suggest that all Friedrich was doing when he created these beautiful pictures was taking pleasure in describing what he saw out his studio window?