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Description of  The Celebrity Monarch: Empress Elisabeth and the Modern Female Portrait (Performing Celebrity)

Empress Elisabeth of Austria (1837-1898), wife of Habsburg Emperor Francis Joseph I, was celebrated as the most beautiful woman in Europe. Glamorous painted portraits by Franz Xaver Winterhalter and widely collected photographs spread news of her beauty, and the twentieth-century German-language film trilogy Sissi (1955-57) cemented this legacy. Despite the enduring fascination with the empress, art historians have never considered Elisabeths role in producing her public portraiture or the influence of her creation. Read more