Lammene 1845

This print, "Lammene," was made by Adolph Kittendorff in Denmark, though we cannot be sure when. It depicts two lambs nestled inside a prehistoric dolmen, a tomb made of large stones. Kittendorff was a landscape painter, but landscape in nineteenth-century Denmark was more than just pretty scenery; it was about national identity. After Denmark lost territory to Prussia in 1864, artists turned to the landscape and its history to define what it meant to be Danish. The dolmen, a relic of Denmark’s ancient past, would have been seen as a potent symbol of the nation’s deep roots. The lambs add an element of pastoral tranquility, perhaps meant to evoke a sense of timelessness and continuity. Analyzing art like this requires understanding the cultural and political context in which it was made, using sources like historical archives, publications, and other artworks from the same period. By studying these resources, we can understand the meaning of art as something that is contingent on social and institutional context.