Portret van Luigi di Gonzaga-Castiglione 1779 - 1829

Carl Hermann Pfeiffer made this print of Luigi di Gonzaga-Castiglione in the late eighteenth or early nineteenth century. The print presents us with a member of the European aristocracy at a moment of upheaval. Consider the conventions of portraiture at this time. Portraits of aristocrats tended to reinforce their power and status. Here, the sitter’s gaze is direct and his bearing confident. But the French Revolution, with its radical challenge to inherited privilege, had already begun in 1789. By the time this portrait was made, aristocratic power was under threat as never before. The inscription below the portrait hints at these tensions, referring to the sitter as a ‘prince’ while also evoking revolutionary ideas of liberty and equality. As historians, we can research the Gonzaga-Castiglione family and the artist, Pfeiffer, to understand the context in which this print was made. This helps us appreciate the complex ways in which art reflects and shapes social and political change.