Jozef in de zegewagen 1645 - 1740

This print, Jozef in de zegewagen, was made by Christoffel van Sichem II, likely in the early 17th century. It's a woodcut, a process where an image is carved into a block of wood, and then printed. Look closely, and you can see the characteristic lines left by the knife. The material of wood is key here. Woodcuts are relatively inexpensive to produce, allowing for wide distribution of images. The labor that went into this work is a key part of its meaning: the hours of painstaking labor involved in the carving. Van Sichem was part of a family tradition of printmaking, a trade with its own rules, tools, and social networks. This print is not just an image, but a product of a specific workshop, a family business, and a particular moment in the history of the printed image. Appreciating the physical process involved is essential to understanding the final image.