Volkswagen Fellowship Symposium 2014 - “Depicting Death True to Life: Violence in Dutch Print and Painting”

David de Boer, University of Konstanz: Depictions of violence played an important role in the news media of the Dutch Republic. Compared to prints from other parts of Europe they often seem particularly cruel. Frans Hogenberg (1535-1590), the first engraver to depict contemporary political events in the Netherlands, devoted most of his prints to furies, massacres, and executions in an attempt to defame the Spanish. But the visualization of extreme violence could also appeal to a sense of just.