Allegorie op de provincie Holland 1746

Curator: So, here we have Jan Caspar Philips' engraving, "Allegorie op de provincie Holland," dating back to 1746. What's your take? Editor: There's such an appealing pastoral feeling, almost a sense of abundance. Like peering into a neatly kept dollhouse diorama…except everything, even the sky, seems a little regimented by the sharp lines of the engraving process. Curator: Absolutely, it's the "Flat Land of Holland," idealized. Look at how Philips juxtaposes genre painting, the landscape, and pure, baroque allegory. See the putti framing the base, bearing the symbols of Holland's prosperity. And above, that meticulously detailed pastoral scene… Editor: The print itself seems preoccupied with Holland’s products—butter, cheese, herring…it’s like a commercial manifesto! I can practically smell the brine from those barrels! Consider all the work that went into crafting the land into fields and farms that sustain these local and global commodities! What about those trades? Curator: You're drawn to the material output; I’m more intrigued by the overall conceit. The detailed rendering of quotidian activities within a grand symbolic framework feels incredibly staged. I imagine the work of farmers rendered almost as if they're parts in a larger system of manufacturing those cheeses or fish. And just behind all the figures you've called to mind, there's an overarching system of making money that encompasses them. Editor: I agree that this baroque need to symbolize is hard at work. Those cherubs literally display and point us to Holland’s self-congratulatory abundance, one where it is impossible not to understand how much this system has everything to do with the exploitation and transformation of labor. Curator: Perhaps. The charm and, I'll admit, odd artificiality of this piece lies exactly in how smoothly it sells us the fantasy that land produces effortlessy with no downsides, an image belied by our knowledge of the realities in this world today, then, or even forever into the future. Editor: Indeed, and reflecting on that irony sharpens our appreciation of how artists can mask political dimensions through apparently simple images. Thank you for helping think through the stakes of viewing it in such manner.