Il Comitato Militare (The Military Committee)

This hand-colored etching depicts figures in military dress and civilian clothes gathered around a pedestal inscribed "Nuova Organizzazione dell'Armata 1795" (New Organization of the Army, 1795). One figure stands atop the monument while others gesture and confer below, their exaggerated poses and facial expressions—characteristic of late-18th-century caricature—suggest bureaucratic confusion or political conflict over military reorganization. The print belongs to the European tradition of political satire popularized by Hogarth and Gillray, using physical distortion and symbolic props to mock government institutions. Italian satire of this period employed similar strategies of bodily caricature and social commentary that would later inform both the German Bilderbogen tradition and eventually modern political cartooning.