Seaside Cemetery (Seefriedhof)

Though devoid of figures, this dark and moody landscape offers a pointed commentary on the relationship between nature and mankind. The pounding surf and fierce wind beset the coastal cemetery and its fragile grave markers, dramatizing the insignificance of human life and death in the face of nature's raw power.

Hungarian by birth, Adolf Hiremy–Hirschl was trained in Vienna. Though the artist was a contemporary of Gustav Klimt, his approach to painting was more traditional and narrative. "Seaside Cemetery," however, demonstrates his sensitivity to the heightened emotional content that was a defining characteristic of symbolism at the end of the 19th century.