Synopses & Reviews
Inand#160;
Capitalism and Cartography in the Dutch Golden Age, Elizabeth A. Sutton explores the fascinating but previously neglected history of corporate cartography during the Dutch Golden Age, from ca. 1600 to 1650. She examines how maps were used as propaganda tools for the Dutch West India Company in order to encourage the commodification of land and an overall capitalist agenda.
Building her exploration around the central figure of Claes Jansz Vischer, an Amsterdam-based publisher closely tied to the Dutch West India Company, Sutton shows how printed maps of Dutch Atlantic territories helped rationalize the Dutch Republicandrsquo;s global expansion. Maps of land reclamation projects in the Netherlands, as well as the Dutch territories of New Netherland (now New York) and New Holland (Dutch Brazil), reveal how print media were used both to increase investment and to project a common narrative of national unity. Maps of this era showed those boundaries, commodities, and topographical details that publishers and the Dutch West India Company merchants and governing Dutch elite deemed significant to their agenda. In the process, Sutton argues, they perpetuated and promoted modern state capitalism.
Review
"A visually rich and intellectually provocative volume."—Elizabeth Hyde, Sixteenth Century Journal Henry Allen Moe Prize - New York State Historical Association
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Winner of the 2011 Henry Allen Moe Prize, asand#160;given by the New York State Historical Association for excellence in exhibitions and collections-based publishing.
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Runner-up for the award for Outstanding Catalogue Based on a Permanent Collection, given by the Association of Art Museum Curators
Review
andldquo;With Capitalism and Cartography in the Dutch Golden Age, Sutton analyzes the history of the Dutch republic and the maps that supported its capitalist and colonial society through a lens that puts the seventeenth century in chilling conversation with our world today. Her close readings of illustrated maps and early modern texts, ranging in subject from Calvinist theology to property law and political philosophy, create a compelling argument for the role maps played in amplifying the power of Amsterdam elites.andrdquo;
Review
andldquo;Sutton argues expertly that cartography is fundamental to the understanding of the capitalist policies of the young Dutch Republic, successfully revealing how maps and the underlying grid systems and Roman-Dutch law played a crucial role in the organization of private ownership, economic expansion, imperial policies, and marketing. Capitalism and Cartography in the Dutch Golden Age skillfully pulls down the barriers between economy and maps; between maps, marketing, and art; and between national histories.andrdquo;and#160;
Review
andldquo;Sutton offers a provocative and compelling examination of the ways Dutch capitalists in the seventeenth century deployed maps as tools for their dominance over the land and other people, as well as ways to express their power and wealth. A strong and stimulating work, Capitalism and Cartography in the Dutch Golden Age is an excellent addition to the fields of art history and the history of cartography.andrdquo;and#160;
Review
andldquo;Capitalism and Cartography in the Dutch Golden Age offers an incisive, compelling analysis of two Dutch phenomena familiar to most historians and art historians andndash; the rise of early modern capitalism and the dissemination of printed maps. In a series of case studies focusing on Amsterdam, New Amsterdam, and the Dutch in Brazil, she explores the interdependency between Dutch mercantilism and mapping with critical aplomb. This timely, innovative account offers new ways of seeing how the structuring principles of mercantile development informed and were informed by Dutch practices of making maps and profile views. At home and abroad, printed maps, she argues, reinforced the rationalist logic of capitalism. While demonstrating a close connection between modes of picturing the Netherlands and the processes by which they were given political form, Sutton also brings her argument forward to the present day and to the continuing relationships between money, power, and visualization.andrdquo;
Synopsis
Commemorating the 400th anniversary of Henry Hudsonand#8217;s voyage and the lasting legacy of Dutch culture in New York, this book explores the life and times of a fascinating woman, her family, and her things. Margrieta was born in the Netherlands but lived at the extremes of the Dutch colonial world, in Malacca on the Malay Peninsula and in Flatbush, Brooklyn. When she came to New York in 1686 with her husband and set up a shop, she brought an astonishing array of Eastern goods, many of which were documented in an inventory made after her death in 1695. Extensive archival research has enabled a collaborative team to reconstruct her story and establish the depth of her connection to Dutch trading establishments in Asia. This is a groundbreaking contribution to the histories of New York City, the Dutch overseas empire, women, and material culture.
About the Author
Deborah Krohn is coordinator for History and Theory of Museums at the Bard Graduate Center, where Peter N. Miller is Dean and Chair of Academic Programs; Marybeth De Filippis is Assistant Curator for American Art at the New-York Historical Society.
Table of Contents
Chapter 1. Capitalism, Cartography, and Culture
Early Modern Capitalism and Cartography
Theorizing Capitalist Cartography
Chapter Outlines
Chapter 2. Amsterdam Society and Maps
The Market for Maps
Organization of Government and the WIC
Pictorial and Intellectual Foundations
Social Organization and Hierarchy
Conclusion
Chapter 3. Capitalism and Cartography in Amsterdam
The Virtuous Merchant and the Republic
Visscher and the Amsterdam Map Tradition
The Beemster
The Grid, Private Property, and the Commonwealth
Chapter 4. Profit and Possession in Brazil
Visscherandrsquo;s WIC-Authorized Map of Pernambuco
Johan Maurits and the Development of Recife and Mauritsstad
Blaeu and Barlaeusandrsquo;s Representation of Brazil
Possession According to Grotius
Natural Rights, Sugar, and Human Exploitation
Trying Times: 1648
Chapter 5. Marketing New Amsterdam
Picturing New Amsterdam
WIC Colonial Policies 1629-49: Possession, Boundaries, Patroons, and Natives
The 1649 Affair
New Amsterdam Renewed
Conclusion
Chapter 6. Capitalism and Cartography Revisited
Acknowledgments
Bibliography
Index