Censored 1887 painting Mors Imperator returns to Berlin
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- Mors Imperator, a 2.5-metre by 1.3-metre 1887 painting by Hermione von Preuschen depicting a skeleton knocking over a royal throne, was rejected by the Berlin Academy of the Arts from its annual exhibition that year over fears it mocked 90-year-old Emperor Wilhelm I.
- The painting is now on display at Berlin's Alte Nationalgalerie from Sunday through mid-November — its first showing in a state institution, lent from a small neighbourhood museum in Berlin's Alt-Mariendorf district.
- Curator Birgit Verwiebe said in-depth studies found no hidden anti-monarchical intent: the coat of arms was a creative invention comparable to French royal insignia, and the falling crown was identified by researchers as based on a French royal crown at the Louvre.
- After the rejection, the 33-year-old von Preuschen wrote directly to the emperor; Wilhelm I's secretary replied that the monarch had no problem with the subject — prompting the academy to reverse its stated reason and cite 'artistic merit' grounds instead.
- Von Preuschen escalated by publishing a letter in a Berlin newspaper and renting a shop on Leipziger Strasse, where she hid the painting behind curtains for a dramatic reveal — charging an admission fee equivalent to €8 today and becoming famous overnight.
- The painting's message that 'death overrules earthly authority' proved literally true: Wilhelm I died on 9 March 1888, making 1888 known in Germany as the 'Year of the Three Emperors' as his son Frederick III also died within 99 days of taking the throne.
- Von Preuschen was also an early advocate for women's art education, delivering an impassioned speech at the 1896 International Women's Congress in Berlin calling for women to be admitted to artistic academies.
Why it matters: The Alte Nationalgalerie display gives Berlin's first state-museum platform to a painting the city's own academy deemed politically dangerous in 1887 — a reversal underscored by the fact that Wilhelm I's own secretary found nothing offensive. It also repositions von Preuschen, previously relegated to a small Alt-Mariendorf neighbourhood museum, as both a censored artist and a 19th-century women's-education pioneer.
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