Gezicht op het tweede waterbassin in het labyrint van een tuin 1742 - 1801

This print, made by Georg Balthasar Probst, depicts a garden maze with elaborate fountains. It's an engraving, meaning the image was incised into a metal plate, likely copper, then inked and pressed onto paper. The fineness of the lines shows the engraver's skill, while the light coloring was added by hand. The print wouldn’t have been considered ‘high art’ but rather a commodity made for sale, catering to the desires of garden enthusiasts. Yet it documents how elite spaces were painstakingly created through a combination of design and manual labor: the architecture of the fountains, and the shaping of hedges. Consider all the work that went into making a pleasure garden like this - and then the print made to depict it. Even in the 18th century, leisure relied on intense production. So, understanding an image like this means considering the full range of processes required to make it.