Germania (Philipp Veit)

The fresco transferred to canvas measures 285 by 192 cm and is exhibited in the Städelsches Kunstinstitut in Frankfurt am Main.

Veit belonged to the artistic circle of the Catholic and conservative Nazarener.

The Germania of this painting is not necessarily to understand as a national allegory of the contemporary debates of a united Germany.

Much more it represents medieval imperial (secular) power that protects the arts.

[1] Often another Germania painting is attributed to Veit, too: that painting hung in the St. Paul's Church in the years 1848 and 1849 when the German National Assembly gathered in Frankfurt.