Hier ziet gy vissen / vogels en zee-monsters fijn / Tot uw vermaak en pleyzier zo groot als klijn / 1725 - 1780

This fanciful sheet of images, teeming with fish, birds, and sea monsters, was printed by Johannes Kannewet in Amsterdam. It's made using woodcut, a relief printing process where the artist carves an image into a block of wood. The remaining raised areas are inked and then pressed onto paper. The thick, bold lines are characteristic of woodcut, giving the images a graphic quality that is both charming and somewhat crude. The coloring was most likely added by hand, a labor-intensive step in the production of these prints. Woodcut, as a printing process, allowed for the relatively quick reproduction of images, making them accessible to a wider audience. Consider the labor involved: from the cutting of the block, inking, and pressing to the hand-application of color, a whole team of makers may have been involved in production. This challenges the notion of the artist as a solitary genius, reminding us that even in art, production is often a social endeavor. These cheap prints brought images and information to an expanding market of consumers.