Schutblad en blad met opschrift van de tekenaar 1795

This opening page of a sketchbook was made by S.G. Casten in March 1795, in the Netherlands. The inscription in Dutch tells us when the book was begun and by whom. This was a tumultuous time in the Netherlands; the old Dutch Republic had been overthrown by French revolutionary forces. The Batavian Republic was then established, with revolutionary committees set up along French lines. Against that background, the act of beginning a sketchbook perhaps took on extra significance. Was this a revolutionary statement? We can only guess what sketches this book may have contained. To understand this object more fully, we would need to investigate the work of other Dutch artists at the time, and consider the influence of the new political regime. The book itself, a relatively inexpensive object, signals a shift in artistic practice, away from the grand public statement and toward something more intimate. By understanding the historical context we can start to understand how this simple statement became art.