Huwelijk van Jacoba van Beieren en Frank van Borselen, 1434 1842 - 1844

Created by Johann Wilhelm Kaiser, this engraving captures the "Marriage of Jacoba van Beieren and Frank van Borselen, 1434," and is located at the Rijksmuseum. The composition centres around the wedding ceremony, where vertical lines are reinforced by the architecture of the church, contrasting with the bowed figures of the wedding couple. The use of black and white as medium emphasizes the solemnity and formality of the occasion. Kaiser uses hatching and cross-hatching to model the figures and create a sense of depth. The arrangement of figures and architectural elements creates a semiotic structure where each element—the church, the couple, the priest—functions as a signifier of religious and social norms. This visual encoding reflects and reinforces the values of its time, and the artwork serves as both a record and an interpretation of a historical event. The formality of the composition and the precision of the engraving technique underscore the enduring power of art.