Although Carl Johann Arnold’s large portrait of Bettine von Arnim is remarkably lifelike and conveys a vivid impression of her home in Berlin, it was not painted until after the writer’s death. Her children commissioned the work to preserve the memory of their mother, who died in 1859. Depicting one of the last representatives of Romanticism, the painting can be seen as an evocative look back on the Romantic movement as whole. It raises the question: What has remained?

In the exhibition, we have introduced the themes of Romanticism with the aid of concrete historical objects. Yet there are many testimonies to the lasting relevance of those themes to the very present. We are the heirs to that period — and shaped by it more than we are perhaps aware. For our last station, we asked the photographer Alexander Paul Englert to capture present-day situations that show traces of Romanticism. At the end of your visit, you are invited to add your own experiences and discoveries to the exhibition.