"Wanderer above the Sea of ​​Fog" is considered the epitome of Romanticism. No other work by Caspar David Friedrich is reproduced or referenced so frequently, and chosen as a starting point for new visual inventions in ever-new variations. Yet the painting is rather unusual for Friedrich's oeuvre: firstly, it is one of his few vertical format works, and secondly, Friedrich rarely placed a single individual so prominently and unmistakably at the center of a composition. While the history of its reception testifies to how much many viewers still try to empathize with the figure of the wanderer, Friedrich was likely not primarily concerned with such identification. He shows us a figure seen from behind, whose position is not readily accessible to us. Moreover, we are not shown what the wanderer is looking at. Instead of being able to enjoy the majestic mountain landscape unhindered, we look at a viewer. It is therefore above all a reflection on seeing that Friedrich's Wanderer invites us to.

-Johannes Grave