Gorge near Amalfi

Painted in 1831 and held in the Alte Nationalgalerie, Gorge near Amalfi is among the most celebrated products of Blechen's Italian journey. The Amalfi coast, with its dramatic combination of sheer limestone cliffs, deep gorges, subtropical vegetation, and the intense blue of the Tyrrhenian Sea, offered German Romantic artists a landscape of almost overwhelming visual richness. Blechen visited the area during his 1828–29 sojourn and made numerous studies that he worked up into finished paintings after his return. The gorge near Amalfi was a specific topographical feature that allowed him to combine the sublime geometry of vertical rock with the sensory delight of southern light and lush plant growth. The work demonstrates how Italy catalysed a fundamental transformation in his technique and palette: the controlled, somewhat oppressive atmospheres of his early German pictures give way here to clarity, warmth, and a new confidence in the expressive possibilities of paint itself.

The near-vertical rock walls create an unusual compositional structure, compressing space and denying the conventional recession of landscape. Blechen exploits this constraint, using the gorge's depth as a tunnel through which light and air are modulated. The vegetation clinging to the rock is handled with an almost impressionistic freedom, patches of warm colour against grey stone. The contrast between the cool depths of the gorge and the brilliant light above is managed through careful tonal gradation.