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The header image shown here is from pate 6 of Alfred Rethel’s Auch ein Todtentanz. A skeleton - Death - rides through a weeping, decimated down on an exhausted horse.
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John M. Olin Library, Level 1, Julian Edison Department of Special Collections Reading Room

Transnational Framings: German Visual Culture in the Age of Nationalism, 1848-1919

On the occasion of Transnational Framings: The German Literary Field in the Age of Nationalism, 1848-1919, the 25th Biennial St. Louis Symposium on German Literature and Culture, the WashU Libraries presents a selection of 19th and early 20th century German, Austrian, and German-American periodicals, prints, and illustrated books from our Special Collections.

The image shows a poster identifying four display cases within the Special Collections Reading Room as the exhibition for Transnational Framings.
A view of the Transnational Framings: German Visual Culture in the Age of Nationalism, 1848-1919 exhibition currently on display in John M. Olin Library.

The symposium highlights the push-and-pull of nationalist and internationalist impulses in German and Austrian literature. The exhibition Transnational Framings: German Visual Culture in the Age of Nationalism, 1848-1919, demonstrates how mass-produced, illustrated media from this period helped mold a national identity following the revolutions of 1848 while also providing a middle-class German audience a window into new worlds, new visions, and a new awareness as citizens of an imperialist power.

This exhibition was organized by the Germanic Languages and Literatures Subject Librarian Walter Schlect for WashU Libraries, with contributions from Special Collections staff.

View the Digital Exhibition of Transnational Framings

Header image: Alfred Rethel, plate 6 of Auch ein Todententanz, 1848. Wood engraving in black on ivory wove paper, 293 × 411 mm.