Painting Regional Identities: Nationalism in the Arts, France, Germany and Spain, 1890—1914

Eric Storm
2009 European History Quarterly  
In the course of the nineteenth century, European high culture became thoroughly nationalized. As part of this process, the common European past, mainly found in Antiquity and Christianity, was redefined along national lines and art, literature, and music increasingly operated within national contexts. Writers and novelists searched their national past for inspiration and appropriate subjects. The same applied to the visual arts: painters and sculptors gradually turned away from scenes of
more » ... cal history or the bible, in favour of themes from national history. 1 Academic painting was not the only vehicle for nationalism, however. During the second half of the nineteenth century Realists and Impressionists also frequently resorted to a nationalist language, albeit more subtle. Instead of idealized classical landscapes they preferred national scenery and the faithful representation of ordinary people in their native country. The competition between the various countries in the art sections at the World's Fairs induced some artists even to pose as essentially 'national' painters. 2 By concentrating on cosmopolitan modernism and the rise of the avant-garde at the end of the nineteenth century, scholars have paid little attention to the influence of nationalist ideology on modern art. This is especially surprising as the cultural and political climate in the decades before the outbreak of the First World War was marked by the rise of more aggressive nationalism. Recent studies have made clear, however, that nationalism continued to have a huge impact on young artists, not only in countries with a strong independence movement, such as Finland and other 'oppressed' nations in eastern Europe, but also in those that were long established nation states. Many Art Nouveau
doi:10.1177/0265691409342651 fatcat:nhghdcwlgjguta72zhsxb6t5wi