Tegeltableau van negen tegels 1600 - 1610

This square panel of nine tiles was made by Hans Bernaert Vierleger, using tin-glazed earthenware. It's a complicated scene, isn’t it? On the one hand, there is the classical ornamentation framing the central image and the two figures that flank the top corners of the piece. But in the middle we see a violent scene: a man being beaten, perhaps even killed. The image asks us to consider how power is expressed through violence. Who is allowed to exercise such power? Whose bodies are vulnerable? While the identities of those depicted remain ambiguous, the dynamics of domination are clear. The tile maker invites us to contemplate how cruelty is normalized, even aestheticized, within certain historical narratives and visual traditions.