Johannes de Doper in een landschap c. 1620 - 1624

Cornelis Bloemaert created this print of John the Baptist in a landscape, but the depiction of religious figures was anything but neutral in the 17th century. During Bloemaert’s life, the Catholic Church was working to reassert its cultural dominance. Artists produced images to inspire faith and reinforce doctrine. Here, John the Baptist is made to look as though he is a classical God from Greek or Roman myth. The positioning of the saint in nature is meant to evoke a sense of divine natural order. There is an idealized form with a nude torso and soft lighting that seems to signal the “correct” way to embody the Saint. It is hard not to wonder how gender and religion are intertwined here; how do they dictate the role of the Saint as a figure of purity? What is more intriguing is how Bloemaert uses this image as a cultural and political statement during a time of religious reformation.