Flute Concert with Frederick the Great in Sanssouci

In the 1840s Menzel created various images for Franz Kugler's ever before popular History of Frederick the Great. Menzel's extreme work on the times and character of Friedrich II, who ruled from 1740 to 1786, was to bear fruit, even besides the book images that made Menzel famous. In addition to the self-contained "culture piece", Die Tafelrunde, the Flute Concert by Adolph Menzel might be considered as among the paintings where Menzel, in totally free and full property of his powers as a painter, strengthened as well as changed his topics in a discreetly changing mix of globe history and also parochial nationalism.

The King of Prussia, a passionately eager flautist that additionally composed for the groove, is playing on the occasion of a see from his sis, the Margravine of Bayreuth. Keeping time with his left foot, he is improvising at a high music stand which protects against any eye contact with the set, to ensure that the structure, arranged alongside the photo airplane, is divided by his figure into audience on the left and chamber ensemble on the right. Among the obvious verticals of the make-up, the severe foreshortening of the groove is very visible.

Menzel's representation of the scene, with its interest to historical precision in both outfit and furnishings, does not illustrate the instrument as just one more unscientific detail, yet instead focuses on the musically flickering, warm candlelight of the theatrically illuminated concert space in Sanssouci, which seems to stream in reverse with its very own choreographed rhythm. As opposed to an apotheosis of the growing of the arts at the court of Frederick the Great, Menzel has produced an atmospheric representation of music-making.