Visser bij een brug 1796 - 1856

This is Reinierus Albertus Ludovicus baron van Isendoorn à Blois's etching, "Visser bij een brug," created sometime between the late 18th and mid-19th century. Van Isendoorn à Blois, born into nobility, lived during a time of significant social upheaval marked by revolutions and shifting class structures. The print depicts two men in transit over a bridge, one fishing and the other leading cattle. Consider the context in which Van Isendoorn à Blois, as a member of the aristocracy, might have viewed these figures. The rural setting seems to evoke an idealized and perhaps romanticized view of pastoral life, as the fishing man peacefully and patiently engages with his surrounds, in stark comparison to the labor and responsibilities assumed by the farmer leading cattle. What does it mean to look at representations of labor and leisure through the eyes of someone born into privilege? What stories are being told, and what perspectives might be missing? This image can be viewed as a meditation on class, labor, and the lens through which we perceive different ways of life.