The Joy of Transformation

This public guided tour offers a unique insight into the current special exhibition, “Pleasure Through Transformation: Animated Greeting Cards from the Romantic Era,” at the German Romantic Museum. The Romantic era was a period of profound social change. Social boundaries became more permeable, the middle class gained influence, and new forms of communication emerged. Against this backdrop, a new custom spread around 1800: sending moving greeting cards for New Year’s became a widely popular trend. Simple greetings turned into small works of art. Cards with flaps, panels, and levers that transform scenes, set figures in motion, and convey messages. Even Goethe raved about these “dainty little creatures that nod, bow, and salute.”

Two exhibition venues, two special exhibitions, various guided tours, plenty of fairy tales, and theatrical tours with Bettine Brentano—there’s plenty to experience at the Großer Hirschgraben. A studio and workshops also offer opportunities to get creative yourself. At the Goethe House, you can experience the unique atmosphere of the home where the poet spent his childhood and youth. The German Romanticism Museum offers insight into a very special era. The stories told there reveal the many facets of Romanticism: an era of cultural history, an aesthetic movement, or simply a feeling.