Seeking Revelation: German Romantic Prints and Drawings

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During the German Romantic movement, active from about 1770 to 1850, many artists hoped to gain a deeper understanding of universal questions. They experienced the French Revolution, France’s invasion of Germany during the Napoleonic Wars (1803–1815), and a shift from the Enlightenment’s emphasis on reason to more interest in emotion and feeling. Decades of changing borders and values led artists to reconsider their national identity and sense of self, as well as their relationship to nature and the divine.

Featuring 84 drawings, prints, and paintings that highlight the Milwaukee Art Museum’s German Romantic collection—one of the strongest in the country—the exhibition examines how artists attempted to comprehend and shape their world. They looked to the sublime beauty of the landscape, religious devotion, and travel to help them respond to the urgent issues of their time. Ultimately, even when it did not uncover answers, the process of seeking offered its own reward. The Romantics’ approach offers an example we can follow today as we live through our own unpredictable moment in history.

Credit: Exhibition overview from museum website

Image credit: Carl Wilhelm Kolbe the Elder (German, 1759–1835), Cow in the Reeds (Die Kuh im Schilfe), ca. 1800/03. Etching. Plate: 11 15/16 × 16 1/2 in. (30.32 × 41.91 cm); sheet: 16 15/16 × 22 13/16 in. (43.02 × 57.94 cm). Purchase, René von Schleinitz Memorial Fund M2001.171. Photo by John R. Glembin