Starting Feb. 3, the Reece Museum and the Department of Literature and Language will have a collaborative exhibit highlighting two German artists, illustrator Claire-Lise Holy and poet Dieter Leisegang.

“This exhibit comes out of, in part of, my work on the artist Claire-Lise Holy, who was also a costume and set designer as my area of research in theater and drama,” said Dr. Katherine Weiss, department chair of Literature and Language and assistant curator of the exhibit. “In part, I know her work from her costume and set design, but also the department deals with English and foreign languages, so this was a really great opportunity for us to highlight German.”

The exhibit features a series of Holy’s original works completed during the later years of her life, accompanied by poems from Leisegang in German, translated into English. The figure Holy has made present in the series of works is Leisegang.

“The poet Dieter Leisegang created miniature paintings as well as poems,” Weiss said. “Claire-Lise and Dieter were kindred spirits, and related in the fact that Claire-Lise married Dieter’s brother, on top of being extremely talented artists.”

Some of the miniature painting Leisegang created are also on display in the exhibit.

“They shared a very rich, close and special relationship,” Weiss said. “To bring this to East Tennessee, where we have a very vibrant German community and art and theater community, is to bring these different things together while bringing something global to the region.”

The artists featured in the exhibit never came to East Tennessee, but Weiss believes that the works on display give patrons an opportunity to see something that isn’t immediately accessible.

The exhibit was accessed through Joachim Leisegang, who was the husband of Holy and brother of Leisegang, meaning this event is a personal one to Holy’s family and is a special treat for ETSU to be able to show the exhibit.

“In Begleitung / In Accompaniment” will be running in the Reece Museum from Feb. 3-April 10. For more information, visit etsu.edu/cas/cass/reece.