The Hussite Sermon

The Hussite Sermon (German - Die Hussitenpredigt) is a painting by the Düsseldorf-based painter Carl Friedrich Lessing, showing an open-air sermon being delivered by a Hussite preacher in the 15th century. It is now in the Alte Nationalgalerie in Berlin.

The Hussite Sermon
ArtistCarl Friedrich Lessing
Mediumoil on canvas
Dimensions223 cm × 293 cm cm (88 in × ??)
LocationAlte Nationalgalerie, Berlin

In 1834 Crown Prince Frederick William of Prussia saw an oil sketch on the subject by Lessing in 1834 and commissioned him between 1835 and 1836 to produce a full-scale version. The mainly-Catholic Rhineland had recently been annexed to the Protestant-dominated Kingdom of Prussia by the Congress of Vienna and so the work was seen as a piece of anti-Catholic propaganda for the area's Protestant minority. In the context of the Restoration of the German princes to their thrones and the Vormärz, others also saw it as a criticism of the repressiveness of the states and systems put in place by Metternich and the Congress. Middle-class audiences saw it as an expression of opposition to kingly and church authority alike. It was briefly exhibited in Germany and Paris, spreading the reputation of the Düsseldorf school of painting.

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