Een moeder verslindt haar kind 1804

Ludwig Gottlieb Portman created this print, Een moeder verslindt haar kind, sometime in the late 18th or early 19th century. The image depicts a mother presenting a covered plate with a child's head on it to a man who stands with his hands in his hair, seemingly aghast. During this period, visual culture was dominated by patriarchal ideas which prescribed a limited role for women, often portraying them as either virtuous mothers or morally corrupt temptresses. Portman’s print seems to be challenging this narrative by positioning the mother as an active, even monstrous, agent. Is this a tale of a mother's desperate act or a critique of societal expectations placed upon women? The raw emotionality captured, from the man's despair to the mother's determined gaze, transcends its immediate historical context. It reflects broader anxieties about gender roles, power, and the monstrous feminine. It invites us to confront uncomfortable truths about the roles we assign to one another.