Frank Mehring


Frank Mehring is a German Americanist and professor at Radboud University Nijmegen.

Life and work

Mehring earned his M.A. at the Justus Liebig University in Giessen, focussing on English Romantic Literature and American Transcendentalism. He received a doctorate in English and American Studies in 2001, exploring the manifestation of transcendentalist ideas in the music of Charles Ives and John Cage. His postdoctoral thesis, The Democratic Gap, examines the transcultural confrontations between German immigrants and the American promise of freedom. Mehring premiered the first performance of the Marshall Plan opera La Sterlina Dollarosa by Alfred Friendly in Germany. He held a three-year visiting professorship at the John F. Kennedy Institute for North American Studies in Berlin. In 2012, Mehring became Professor of American Studies at Radboud University Nijmegen. Mehring also serves as President of the and as an honorary museum director.

Main research areas

Mehring's research focuses on the intersection of culture, media and politics in order to trace transfer processes between Europe and North America. His work on the transcultural confrontation of German immigrants such as Charles Follen, Ottilie Assing, Winold Reiss, Kurt Weill, Hans J. Massaquoi, and Hannah Arendt received the European Rob Kroes Award in Transnational American Studies.
Mehring's work is informed by foci on intermediality in popular culture and cultural mobility in transatlantic contexts. The CD Poe-Attic-Lies-Sense emerged from his book on Sight & Sound with poems of English and American Romanticism set to music, followed by recordings of Dutch liberation songs in the book on Soundtrack van de Bevrijding , also published as video clips as part of the Canadian Tulips Festival. Concerts with pianist Jens Barnieck, with whom he produced the sound installation The Mexico Diary based on diary entries by Winold Reiss. Other biographical projects focus on Antonia Brico, the first conductor from the Netherlands, and on the band Van Halen, whose roots lie in Amsterdam and Nijmegen. In commemoration of the 80th anniversary of the Canadian liberation and in recognition of his efforts to preserve the soundtrack of liberation, Frank received a handcrafted Canadian Liberation Guitar from Richard Thain at the Freedom Museum in Groesbeek. The instrument serves as a sonic ambassador, enabling him to convey the history of lost and regained freedom through his musical performances.
Mehring wrote the German biography of the German-American freedom fighter and abolitionist Charles Follen and published a selection of Follen's works in 2007. He helped erecting a commemorative plaque in the city of Romrod where Follen was born. In Berlin, he organized the first international symposium on the German-American artist, teacher and designer Winold Reiss at the Free University of Berlin. He published an overview of Reiss's work in the book The Multicultural Modernism of Winold Reiss – National Approaches to his Work
Together with Tatiani Rapatzikou and Stefan L. Brandt, he founded the journal AmLit and the EAAS Digital Studies Network. Mehring volunteers as director of the Museum Forum Arenacum on the subject of art, culture and history in the Lower Rhine region. Since 2024, Frank Mehring has served as the President of the Netherlands American Studies Association. In this role, he oversees the organization's efforts to promote interdisciplinary research, academic collaboration, and cultural exchange between the Netherlands and the United States. Frank is a co-founder of the Digital Studies Network at the European Association for American Studies (EAAS) and of the peer-reviewed online journal American Literatures. He is an active member of the German Academic Scholarship Foundation and serves as a regional leader of the German Atlantic Association.

Publications (selection)

As author

Sight & Sound: Naturbilder in der Englischen und Amerikanischen Romantik. Tectum-Verlag, Marburg 2001, Sphere Melodies: Die Manifestation Transzendentalistischer Ideen in der Musik von Charles Ives und John Cage. Metzler, Stuttgart 2003, Karl/Charles Follen: Deutsch-Amerikanischer Freiheitskämpfer.. Universitätsverlag Ferber, Giessen 2004, The Democratic Gap: Transcultural Confrontations of German Immigrants and the Promise of American Democracy. Winter, Heidelberg 2014, De Soundtrack van de Bevrijding: Swingen, Zingen en Dansen op Weg naar Vrijheid. Vantilt, Nijmegen, 2015. . Songs of Liberation in the Netherlands: The Transatlantic Soundtrack of Freedom. Amsterdam: AUP, 2025. BEUYS LAND. Gerd Ludwig. Lammerhuber, Wien, 2024.

As editor

Between Natives and Foreigners. Selected Writings of Karl/Charles Follen. With an introduction by Frank Mehring. Lang, New York 2007, Transcultural Spaces: Challenges of Urbanity, Ecology, and the Environment in the New Millennium. With Winfried Fluck, Stefan Brandt. Narr, Tübingen 2010.. With Hans Bak, Mathilde Roza. Brill, Amsterdam 2018, Sound and Vision: Intermediality and American Music. With Erik Redling. In European Journal of American Studies. 12, 2017, ISSN The Multicultural Modernism of Winold Reiss – National Approaches to his Work. Deutscher Kunstverlag, Berlin 2022. . With Stefan Brandt and Tatiani G. Rapatzikou. AmLit – American Literatures. 3.1. . With Jaap Verheul. Amsterdam University Press, 2025.. Dutch Version: . Walburg Pers, 2025. 978-9-464564891

Museum Director

Frank Mehring serves as the honorary museum director of the Museum Forum Arenacum in Rindern. The museum, with a focus on Roman and Franconian history, is a vital center for understanding the formative years of artist Joseph Beuys. Under Mehring's guidance, the museum has initiated the "art and climate change" project which uses art to read landscape through an ecological lens.
In 2021, Mehring initiated the photographic landscape installation Beuys Land, featuring the work of German-American photographer Gerd Ludwig, to explore the connection between art and climate change in the unique natural landscape of Beuys' youth between Kleve in Germany and Nijmegen in the Netherlands.

Exhibitions (selection)

  • 2021: Joseph Beuys: Kindheit und Jugend in Rindern, Forum Arenacum, Rindern
  • 2021: Bäume, Beuys & Brüx. Forum Arenacum, Rindern
  • 2022: Retro: Von Brüx bis Brüx 1902–2002, Forum Arenacum, Rindern
  • 2023: Industrie-Fotografie: Josef Hintzen, Forum Arenacum, Rindern
  • 2023: Resonanz: Fritz Poorten – Wasserburg-Kapelle in Rindern
  • 2024: The Liberation 80 Years Ago - From Market Garden to the Rhineland Offensive
  • 2025: The Van Halen Story: From Nijmegen Roots to Global Success
Since becoming a museum director, Frank Mehring has played a key role in publishing several works that bridge local art history, cultural studies, and transatlantic relation enriching both scholarly discourse and public engagement with cultural heritage. His publications feature collaborations with internationally renowned photographers such, as well as acclaimed illustrators and artists. In 2025, Mehring appeared in the ARTE documentary Der mystische Rhein von Joseph Beuys, discussing the cultural and environmental legacy of the artist.

Publications

  • Frank Mehring, Kurt Kreiten : Die Wasserburg Rindern im Wandel der Zeit: Jagdschloss, Gefechtsstand und Bildungsstätte. Kleve, 2020.
  • Gerd Ludwig, Frank Mehring: Beuys Land. Lammerhuber, 2024.
  • Frank Mehring, Die Kaese-Spionin: Das Geheimnis des Gelben Buches. Rindern: Edition Mosaik, 2025.