Portret van Frederik II van Pruisen in versierde lijst 1811 - 1867

Alphonse Boilly made this print of Frederick II of Prussia sometime in the first half of the 19th century. Boilly was a French artist, but here he depicts a German king. The ornamental frame and the king’s military attire speak to the aesthetics of power. We can ask: what exactly was Boilly trying to communicate about Frederick the Great? The answer may lie in the complex relationship between France and Prussia in the 18th and 19th centuries. Frederick, who died in 1786, was an important military and political rival to France. But by the 1800s, after the Napoleonic wars, Prussia and France were on more amicable terms. This image of Frederick II is most likely an example of strategic nation-building through art. Prints like this one can tell us a lot about the political history of Europe. By consulting sources from the period, we can better understand the image’s function in shaping public opinion.