Heuvellandschap met man en hond 1659

Karel du Jardin created this tiny etching, "Heuvellandschap met man en hond", with lines that carve out a whole world. The composition pulls you in with a massive tree on the left, its limbs like reaching arms, balancing the mountains in the distance. A man and his dog cross the river, and the etching captures the textural contrast between rough bark and smooth water. Du Jardin uses a semiotic system of signs, embedding cultural codes of the time within the landscape. This work challenges fixed meanings by destabilizing the established hierarchy between humans and nature, inviting ongoing interpretation and re-interpretation.