Fliegende Blätter
„Fliegende Blätter“, a humourous-satirical weekly was published from 1844 to 1944 by Braun & Schneider, a Munic publishing house. The individual issues, each about eight pages long, appeared weekly, for years undated.
"Fliegende Blätter" were highly esteemed for their precise and satirical characterization of the German bourgeoisie and can be considered as a compendium of humorous social criticism. Two popular comic characters - Biedermann and Bummelmeier - gave their names to the term "Biedermeier".
The artistic and typographical quality is remarkable. The initiators of "Fliegende Blätter" were the bookseller and illustrator Kaspar Braun (1807-1877) and the publisher Friedrich Schneider (1815-1864), the owners of the publishing house "Braun & Schneider". The astonishing expressive quality of the illustrations is due to the fact that the engravers were trained by the publishing house to print illustrations directly from the woodblock (galvanizing techniques were introduced in 1885).
A number of renowned artists contributed to "Fliegende Blätter", e.g. Wilhelm Busch, Gustav Adolf Closs, Hans Kaufmann, Adolf Oberländer, Franz Graf von Pocci, Moritz von Schwind and Carl Spitzweg.
The digitization of the journals was part of the project “Digitization and Indexing of Illustrated Art and Satire Journals from the 19th and early 20th century” funded by the Deutsche Forschungsgemeinschaft (DFG).”
Online Bibliographie scroll to top
- Grand-Carteret, John: Les Fliegende Blaetter - La Caricature Humaine, in: Ders.: Les moeurs et la caricature en Allemagne - en Autriche - en Suisse: ouvrage illustré, Paris 1885, S. 231-290.
- Miris, A. v.: Von den Münchener "Fliegenden Blättern", in: Die Kunst für Alle. Malerei, Plastik, Graphik, Architektur, Band 6, München 1890, S. 17-22 u. 33-36.
- Oßwald, Elsa: Die Karikatur des Künstlers. Ein kulturwissenschaftlicher Beitrag zur Künstlerdarstellung in der Satirezeitschrift Fliegende Blätter bis zur Reichsgründung, Magisterarbeit, Universität Trier, 2012