Arts and Music Atlas

Works, Makers, Traditions
Sign In
Text size
100%
Theme
Work

Cross in the Mountains

History, Religious and Mythological Paintings

Cross in the Mountains, also known as the Tetschen Altar, is an oil painting by the German artist Caspar David Friedrich, designed as an altarpiece and completed in 1808. Among Friedrich's first major works, it marked an important break with the conventions of landscape painting by introducing explicit Christian iconography into what had previously been considered a lesser genre of art. Because religious history painting was regarded as the highest genre at the time, Friedrich's use of landscape to carry a spiritual message was controversial, provoking debate between proponents of neoclassical ideals and supporters of the new German Romanticism associated with Friedrich and his circle. This description is adapted from Wikipedia contributors under CC BY-SA 4.0; changes were made. https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/4.0/

Facts
Year Created
1808 1
Medium
Oil on canvas 1
Location
Galerie Neue Meister, Dresden 1
Commissioned By
Countess Theresia von Thun-Hohenstein 1
Classification
Genre
Painting 1
Medium
Medium (category)
Oil on Canvas 1
Connections

Created By

Source Cross in the Mountains (Wikipedia)

In Form

Painting, Art Forms
Source Cross in the Mountains (Wikipedia)

In Genre

Painting, Art Forms

Entity-backed identity for the genre enum value this work already carries, resolved to an arts art-form by an explicit value-to-entity map (phase 3 bucket conversion, docs\design_entity_backed_browse_buckets_20260928.md). The genre fact itself, with its own citation, stays on the work unchanged.

In the Other Atlases
Sources
1. Cross in the Mountains (Wikipedia)
  • Infobox, year field
    1808 (1808)
  • Infobox, medium field
    Oil on canvas
  • Infobox, location field
    Galerie Neue Meister, Dresden
  • Commission section
    By Lilienstern's account, the altar was commissioned by the Countess Theresia von Thun-Hohenstein for her Catholic family's chapel in Tetschen, Bohemia.
  • Genre reference
    Cross in the Mountains, also known as the Tetschen Altar, is an oil painting by the German artist Caspar David Friedrich, designed as an altarpiece and completed in 1808.
  • In Form: Painting, lead paragraph
    Cross in the Mountains, also known as the Tetschen Altar, is an oil painting by the German artist Caspar David Friedrich designed as an altarpiece. Among Friedrich's first major works, the 1808 painting marked an important break w
  • Created By: Caspar David Friedrich, lead paragraph
    Cross in the Mountains, also known as the Tetschen Altar, is an oil painting by the German artist Caspar David Friedrich designed as an altarpiece. Among Friedrich's first major works, the 1808 painting marked an important break w
View the Source
Comments (0)
No comments yet. Be the first to share a thought.
Reader Challenges (0)
No disputes yet. Spotted an error or a better source? Open the first one.