Illustratie voor 'Den Arbeid van Mars' van Allain Manesson Mallet 1672

This is Romeyn de Hooghe’s etching for Allain Manesson Mallet's book ‘The Labor of Mars’, a handbook on warfare and fortification published in the late 17th century. De Hooghe was working in a Netherlands that was enjoying its Golden Age, but, as a seafaring nation, was also in constant military conflict. The print combines the graphic language of technical drawing with that of landscape. The upper portion meticulously diagrams the geometric layout of a star fort, while below, a naturalistic landscape unfolds, complete with mountains, a river, and fortified towns. A banner proclaims "Monts Pyrenees," locating us in the politically contested borderlands between France and Spain. De Hooghe’s image speaks to the complex relationship between power, knowledge, and representation during an era of intense geopolitical competition. The cool rationality of the fort design stands in contrast to the romantic depiction of the landscape, and the image speaks to the way the natural world was being reshaped by human ambition and military strategy. It asks us to consider the human cost of these designs, the lives uprooted, and the landscapes scarred in the name of progress and security.