Portret van Marie Louise van Oostenrijk 1795 - 1805

This portrait of Marie Louise of Austria is a print, made through the process of stipple engraving. This was a popular commercial technique in the 18th and 19th centuries, prized for its ability to mimic the soft tones of chalk drawings. Look closely, and you can see the multitude of tiny dots that create the image. These would have been incised into a copper plate using a special tool called a rocker. It was laborious work. The engraver would have had to be highly skilled to render the likeness of Marie Louise and the texture of her opulent garments. Prints like this one were part of a rapidly expanding visual culture, thanks to innovations in industrial production. They made images accessible to a broader public, but also relied on a system of labour that often went unacknowledged. By understanding the work and skill involved in its making, we can begin to appreciate the full complexity of its cultural significance.