SCHINKEL, Karl Friedrich
(b. 1781, Neuruppin, d. 1841, Berlin)

The Banks of the Spree near Stralau

1817
Oil on canvas, 36 x 45 cm
Nationalgalerie, Berlin

On a stretch of the Spree popular with river trippers from Berlin, two horn players are ferried across after a day's festivities. At evening, their work, like the fishing on the river, is done, and their passage home becomes an image of human life, a crossing with connotations of death, leading to a mysterious end.




© Web Gallery of Art, created by Emil Krén and Daniel Marx.