Drie ingekwartierde Franse soldaten lachen een dienstmeid uit als zij betaling vraagt voor de drank, 1795 1795 - 1796

This drawing, made in 1795 by Johan Daniël de Gijselaar, presents a scene of French soldiers mocking a maidservant who is asking for payment. Above the soldiers is a poster with the inscription 'l'égalité'. This mockery holds deep irony, doesn't it? 'Equality', a sacred word of the Revolution, is reduced to a cruel joke by these occupiers. The very presence of the soldiers, reveling without payment, signifies the blatant hypocrisy of their supposed ideals. One recalls similar scenes from the Thirty Years' War, captured by Callot, where soldiers, under the guise of order, perpetrate chaos. Consider the visual rhythm: the soldiers' rowdy laughter and the maid's silent appeal. One is reminded of the Commedia dell’arte characters, whose exaggerated gestures also aimed to expose societal truths, albeit through satire. The enduring human capacity for both idealism and brutal contradiction echoes through history, a recurring motif in the theater of life.