Wandalmanak voor het jaar 1552 1552

Editor: This piece is called "Wandalmanak voor het jaar 1552", from 1552. It's unattributed, so made by an anonymous artist. It's a mixed media work: a drawing using watercolor over engraving, woodcut and print. I find the grid format really striking. It seems both very orderly, and then when you look closer, it feels pretty chaotic with the mix of text and illustrations. What jumps out to you when you see this? Curator: What immediately grabs my attention is how this calendar, a supposedly objective tool, is laden with cultural and religious assumptions. Consider the very top – a depiction which seems to judge different human “types.” Editor: Different "types?" Like, professions, or social classes? Curator: Perhaps, but look closer. Who benefits from these visual representations? Who is implicitly deemed virtuous, and who is marked as other, perhaps even dangerous? We need to ask: How does this calendar function not just as a marker of time, but as a subtle enforcer of social norms and hierarchies? The images are hand-colored too, drawing attention to the most salient, or propagandist elements. Editor: So, it's more than just a calendar... it’s also reflecting and maybe reinforcing power dynamics? It's interesting to think about how something so functional can also be so political. Curator: Exactly. Think about who was literate, who had access to this, and whose narratives were privileged in its creation. What does this tell us about early Northern Renaissance society, about the relationship between knowledge, power, and representation? The images, choice of colors and text placement become loaded with meaning when viewed through a critical lens. Editor: That makes me see it in a totally different light. I was focused on the design, but you've highlighted the layers of social commentary embedded in something seemingly straightforward. Curator: It's in that tension, between the mundane and the ideological, that the artwork truly speaks. Editor: Thank you. I’ll be thinking about that for a while!