Naaktlopers te Amsterdam, 1535 1629 - 1652

Curator: This image feels like a fever dream. All these naked figures in the street… a bit unnerving, wouldn't you say? Editor: It's certainly intense. What we're looking at is a print titled "Naaktlopers te Amsterdam, 1535," created sometime between 1629 and 1652 by Pieter Hendricksz. Schut. It’s currently held in the Rijksmuseum collection. The artist has rendered this tumultuous scene through the meticulous techniques of etching and engraving. Curator: Etching and engraving… that accounts for the stark contrasts and those incredibly fine lines. They almost give the figures a sculptural quality. I wonder, though, about the title... "Naaktlopers"... "Naked Walkers?" What's the story here? Editor: Yes, that is a literal, direct translation. Based on the text, seven men and five women burned their clothes in Amsterdam's Sonneheegh neighbourhood in February of 1535, running naked through the streets yelling, "Woe, woe, the vengeance of God". I read it as more than just some odd occurrence, the "naaktlopers" or naked runners becoming symbols themselves of some deeper societal unease. The figures certainly convey hysteria. The raising of arms could easily be that symbol of surrender too, for instance. Curator: Societal unease manifested through public nudity... It makes one ponder the underlying psychology of performance here. Are these figures liberated, expressing vulnerability, or perhaps exhibiting defiance against convention or oppression? Is there liberation or perhaps a sort of penitence in this nakedness? Editor: Perhaps there’s an element of purification too. Stripping away the worldly and laying oneself bare before a higher power. We are seeing more than what's depicted, Pieter Hendricksz. Schut has captured so much human emotion in such a compressed format. What's captured here is so enduring, that no matter the date it feels so incredibly alive to me. Curator: I agree. These nude bodies transcend time somehow. Raw, exposed, both vulnerable and shockingly present. It's a strange echo we catch in that frozen moment from the distant past. Editor: Precisely, and how the artist's chosen medium further echoes how the emotional cultural memory remains.