Koning en koningin zittend op de troon 1830 - 1845

This small print, "King and Queen Sitting on the Throne," was made by Henricus Wilhelmus Couwenberg, probably sometime in the 1830s or 40s. It's rendered in a technique called etching, where lines are bitten into a metal plate with acid, then inked and printed. In this case, the print offers a shadowy glimpse into a royal court. The figures are stiff and somewhat dwarfed by the architecture around them. The throne itself is a rather spindly affair. You can sense the amount of work involved in creating this image, all the tiny, precise marks made by the artist's hand. But this labor-intensive quality stands in stark contrast to the scene depicted. Although this is a print, which allows for relative ease of reproduction, the image itself portrays a world of power and privilege, far removed from the concerns of everyday life. It makes you wonder about the relationship between the artist, the patrons who commissioned such works, and the social realities of the time. It invites us to consider how images like this helped to uphold a particular vision of authority.