Vignet met een ridder die de keten van de Saint-Esprit ontvangt 1760

This print of an etching was made by Laurent Cars in eighteenth-century France and it depicts a knight receiving the chain of the Order of the Holy Spirit. This chivalric order, associated with the French monarchy, visually communicates power through formal presentation. Think about the way the image is framed, with the King seated on a dais receiving a kneeling knight, who is surrounded by other members of the court. How does this reinforce ideas of status and hierarchy? Cars was born into a family of painters and engravers, and he later became a member of the Royal Academy, France’s most important art institution. To understand this artwork, we need to look to institutional histories. Resources like the Academy’s archives might reveal Cars’s role within the art world and how he navigated social and political expectations. We can consider the public role of art, and reflect on how imagery reflects the political and cultural values of its time.