Watch out, Bavaria!

What is typically Bavarian? Where does the image of the shoe-slapping, yodelling, beer-drinking, farmer-smart or brawling Bavarian in lederhosen come from? This Bavarian cliché has been spreading around the world since the 19th century, when the postcard began its journey as a fast and inexpensive medium. The editor at Allitera Verlag in Munich, Dietlind Pedarnig, has studied this Bavarian culture and published the book "Obacht, Bayern! A country and its cliché in historical humour postcards".
The exhibition in the Mesnerhaus near Kloster Seeon (Seeon Monastery) with the same title shows a wide selection of historical humour postcards (1870 - 1945) and reveals connections of current relevance.
In 1870, the first German postcard began its journey and enjoyed an unexpectedly rapid success. In the postcard's heyday around 1900, one billion postcards were sent throughout Germany every year. Tourism, which was emerging at this time, certainly contributed significantly to this boom. An absolute bestseller: the genre of so-called humour (or joke) cards. Bavarian publishers did profitable business with depictions of mountains, beer, Dirndl and Lederhosen or the dachshund, and with them illustrators, painters and graphic artists. The exhibition is a humorous journey through Bavarian self-images and invites you to discover with a smile how Bavarians saw themselves and how others saw them.

Last edited on 07.10.2025