Portrait of Rubens' mother, seen through a window opening 1775

Editor: This is Karl Mathias Ernst's 1775 mixed-media print, "Portrait of Rubens' mother, seen through a window opening," currently at the Met. The window framing the portrait creates this very intimate, almost voyeuristic feel. What's striking to me is the sheer labor involved in creating this intricate engraved image. What do you make of it? Curator: I'm immediately drawn to the materials themselves, particularly how the act of engraving, of physically cutting into a metal plate, transforms an image of nobility. The printed medium makes a portrait, usually reserved for the wealthy, reproducible. Consider the socioeconomic implications of wider distribution. Editor: So, you are thinking about accessibility versus exclusivity. That's a fresh point. The materiality flattens out class distinctions somewhat? Curator: Precisely! This wasn’t just about replicating a likeness; it's about labor and dissemination. We must investigate the societal structures that dictate who had access to art and how that access was challenged through means of mechanical reproduction. This engraving is a consumer good itself. Editor: Interesting. I hadn't considered the political dimensions of printmaking and how it might reflect on class distinctions. How radically different this feels from, say, oil on canvas. Curator: It truly highlights a tension within Baroque art – the desire for opulence against a rising tide of different types of consumption by new classes. Notice, for instance, the detail of the text printed on the lower section of the print: it points to the dedicatee. How does this dedicatory text function in the piece itself, as object? Editor: This makes me want to delve deeper into the printing industry and the social function that works like this would have played at the time. I'm used to only ever considering prints in terms of formal qualities, which now feels like only half the picture.