Reiziger bij een boerderij 1788 - 1849

Johan Christiaan Willem Safft made this etching, "Traveller at a Farm" around the turn of the nineteenth century in the Netherlands. This image provides an interesting window onto the romanticization of rural life occurring at that time. The thatched roof cottage and the traveler trudging along a sandy path evoke the Dutch countryside. But it's worth noting how carefully constructed the image is. The composition directs our eye, arranging the natural and the man-made elements into a balanced whole. We can ask, what political function does this kind of image serve? The Netherlands, as a republic, had a relatively weak central government. Cultural institutions like art academies and museums were still in their infancy. In this context, images that evoke a shared sense of place became a means of imagining the nation itself. To further understand this etching, we might consider its place in the broader culture of Dutch landscape art. It can prompt us to think about what the social function of art can be, and to see how the meaning of an image changes over time depending on the context in which it is seen.