Het Comité van Algemeen Welzijn (The Committee for General Welfare)

This etching depicts five figures outside an apothecary shop, presenting a satirical scene of Dutch political committee members. The composition employs caricature—exaggerated physiognomy and costume—to mock bureaucratic authority. One seated figure dominates the composition while others gesture and confer, suggesting incompetence or corruption in governance. The apothecary facade hints at false remedies for social ills. The print belongs to a rich tradition of political satire tracing from Hogarth and Gillray through Rowlandson and Daumier—artists who used engraving and etching to circulate social commentary to mass audiences. Such prints attacked power through grotesque distortion of the body and face, establishing visual conventions that would later shape editorial cartooning and comic art, where caricature remains a tool for political critique.