Wisselkantoor van Lodewijk XIV (Louis XIV's Exchange Office)

This Dutch engraving satirizes French financial corruption during Louis XIV's reign. Two grotesque figures—a nobleman and a merchant or money-changer—conduct business at a table laden with coins, while a third figure observes from behind. The allegorical imagery references the debasement of currency and mismanagement of state funds. Printed text surrounds the composition, a common format in Northern European broadsheet satire. The work exemplifies the Dutch tradition of political print-making, which deployed caricature and grotesque figuration to critique foreign powers and domestic abuses. This lineage—from 17th-century Dutch broadsheets through Hogarth, Gillray, and beyond—established visual satire as a tool of public discourse and laid groundwork for the sequential narrative art of comics.