Talk:The Abbey in the Oakwood

This article is within the scope of WikiProject Visual arts, a collaborative effort to improve the coverage of visual arts on Wikipedia. If you would like to participate, please visit the project page, where you can join the discussion and see a list of open tasks.Visual artsWikipedia:WikiProject Visual artsTemplate:WikiProject Visual artsvisual arts articles

Germany Low‑importance

	Germany portal This article is within the scope of WikiProject Germany, a collaborative effort to improve the coverage of Germany on Wikipedia. If you would like to participate, please visit the project page, where you can join the discussion and see a list of open tasks.GermanyWikipedia:WikiProject GermanyTemplate:WikiProject GermanyGermany articles
Low	This article has been rated as Low-importance on the project's importance scale.

A fact from The Abbey in the Oakwood appeared on Wikipedia's Main Page in the Did you know column on 27 November 2008, and was viewed approximately 3,541 times (disclaimer) (check views). The text of the entry was as follows:

Did you know... that in The Abbey in the Oakwood (pictured) German romantic painter Caspar David Friedrich symbolically depicted "the burial of Germany's hopes for resurrection"?

A record of the entry may be seen at Wikipedia:Recent additions/2008/November.

Wikipedia

I translated this article from the German. Feel free to expand it or correct "mein Deutsch". Lithoderm (talk) 01:21, 21 November 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Two small queries

1) the intro says it was painted between 1808 and 1810, but the rest of the article says that it was painted between 1809 and 1810 - which should it be? (presumably 1809, but wouldn't want to guess at it) sorted (copy/paste error, apparently)
2) "tawny owl" - the image is too small to see any owl at all, but confirmation requested that on the original the species of owl is identifiable? HeartofaDog (talk) 13:47, 22 November 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Hmmm... I can't make out any owl at all, using the zoom-able viewer on the Web gallery of art. Of course, there would be precedent for it in Friedrich's drawings- not that that verifies this. Can anyone with printed references verify this? Lithoderm 18:20, 22 November 2008 (UTC)[reply]

This looks more like a horned owl
Another drawing that looks more like a horned owl
An actual great horned owl
This might be a tawny owl.... but the motif is clear.
An actual tawny owl-- notice the absence of horns

Thanks for the above hard work on this, which makes the point highly effectively that a horned owl is recgnisable in silhouette even if it is very small, whereas a tawny owl probably isn't. I noticed that in the edit history of the German article on which this is based, that there was criticism of some of it for being too much based on "personal observation" in the gallery - I wonder, since as yet there is no evidence apart from this one unsupported assertion of the existence of any sort of owl, whether it would be better to hide that sentence pending confirmation? HeartofaDog (talk) 12:23, 24 November 2008 (UTC)[reply]

I agree, and will do so. I cannot make out any owl, even in the printed reproductions I have. Thanks for taking another look at the original article. Lithoderm 13:44, 24 November 2008 (UTC)[reply]