Slag bij Jemmingen, 1568 1568 - 1570

Curator: The image before us is entitled "Slag bij Jemmingen, 1568", or "Battle of Jemmingen, 1568". Created sometime between 1568 and 1570 by Frans Hogenberg, it's currently held at the Rijksmuseum. My first thought looking at it is one of complexity and devastation. Editor: It's striking how dense the image is—almost chaotic. All those figures and structures crammed together really convey a sense of overwhelming turmoil, I think. You almost feel claustrophobic looking at it. What visual elements strike you the most? Curator: For me, it’s the walled city overlooking the battle. Cities have been such resonant symbols throughout time, encapsulating power, security, and the illusion of permanence, I think, it represents civilization at its most vulnerable here. How do you interpret its significance within the larger composition? Editor: Absolutely, and knowing the context—this battle being a critical moment in the Eighty Years' War, a fight for Dutch independence from Spanish rule—that besieged city really speaks to themes of resistance and the fight for self-determination against an oppressive empire. It shows more than it says. The fact that its being besieged reflects what the Dutch experienced then, doesn’t it? Curator: Exactly. And look at the way Hogenberg employs these repetitive patterns to portray soldiers—rows and rows of them—lines and lines. Such figures in the collective allow viewers to ponder notions of sacrifice and dehumanization in the theatre of war. How can viewers relate today, I wonder? Editor: Definitely. And you see how they become almost abstract in their uniformity, that brings in important concepts of collective trauma, and power structures as they affected the social dynamics in that region at the time. The tiny individual really became just an element in some larger, unavoidable movement or pattern. How do we view them within contemporary struggles, I keep thinking… Curator: Such powerful themes represented here… it truly captures an iconic moment and makes it somehow transcend its temporal boundaries. I have never really thought of this before… Editor: This piece offers an engaging entry point to examine warfare as a broader sociopolitical turning point. To rethink resistance, identity and history through the chaos on display in this one image has made me realize how relevant it is, beyond its historical setting.