Out of the Shadow of Maria Sibylla Merian

The two portraits show that, despite her scientific achievements in a male-dominated scientific world, Merian was unable to entirely escape the gender norms of her time.

Even today, there are differing views on Merian’s achievements. On the one hand, Merian is seen as an influential naturalist and a ‘strong woman’ in history. On the other hand, she has been criticised for her lesser-known status as a slaveholder.

At the age of 52, Merian travelled with her daughter to Suriname, where she worked on her Metamorphosis. In this large-format volume, Merian documented Surinamese insects and their metamorphosis. The book is illustrated with sixty hand-coloured copper engravings and was first published in 1705, more than half a century before the much better-known Species Plantarum by Carl Linnaeus, which is regarded as the starting point of the systematic naming of plants. Merian's remarkable journey and her exceptional botanical work brought her international fame.

Merian and Linnaeus lived during the Enlightenment, when classifying and ordering the world were more important than ever. Eighteenth-century European scientists were fascinated by logic and rationality as a means of understanding the world. Enlightenment science was based on the idea that the entire world could be reduced to hierarchical categories within a system of knowledge and power.

Merian is often praised for having managed, as a woman, to circumvent the prevailing social gender norms and pursue a career as a scientist in a man’s world. Her views on what women were capable of and permitted to do seemed progressive for her time. In Metamorphosis, alongside the illustration of the peacock flower, Merian writes: ‘The Indians, who are not treated well when they are in the service of the Dutch, use it to abort their children because they do not want their children to become slaves like them. The Black enslaved women of Guinea and Angola must be treated very kindly, or they do not desire children in this state of slavery and do not have any. Indeed, they sometimes take their own lives because of the customary harsh treatment inflicted upon them, for they believe that they will be reborn in freedom in the land of their friends, as they told me in their own words.’

In this text, also known as the peacock flower passage, Merian describes how enslaved women on plantations in Suriname used the peacock flower to induce abortions, sparing their unborn babies a life of slavery.

In 1997, Sybe Rispens writes in the Dutch daily newspaper Trouw: 'Maria Sibylla's extensive notes are not limited to the world of insects. She also has a keen eye for the social injustices of slavery. In one of her notes, she describes the herbal mixture enslaved women use to abort their children, so that they will not have to endure the brutality of the Dutch.'

This is how the peacock flower passage is often interpreted: as a sign of Merian’s empathy. At the same time, the passage is read as confirmation that Merian herself also used enslaved people in her work. This is also evident from other passages in Metamorphosis, in which she describes sending men and women into the dense rainforest to collect plants for her. Merian also learned a great deal about plants and herbs from enslaved people and the Indigenous inhabitants of Suriname—knowledge passed down orally that was indispensable to her book.

Although Merian herself managed to bend the norms of womanhood, she also played a role in the oppression of enslaved men and women. She went so far as to abduct one of the Surinamese women, whom Merian called “my Indian.” The woman was listed anonymously on the passenger manifest of the ship bound for Amsterdam and accompanied Merian on her return journey from Suriname to the Netherlands. Unfortunately, what happened to this woman after she arrived in Amsterdam is unknown.

Recognizing Merian’s resilience as a female scientist therefore also requires us to see her as an active participant in a colonial slave economy and as a manager of enslaved people.

Indigenous people of Suriname, Black women and Javanese women: these women helped Merian with the research that made her famous. Yet unlike Merian herself, they are not part of our collective memory. In Of Palimpsests and Erasure, Kaersenhout therefore honours the women connected to Merian’s drawings who have been erased from history. These women were people with feelings, dreams and a wealth of knowledge about plants and their medicinal properties.

Kaersenhout honours them with a series of drawings depicting various figures against the backdrop of an open book reminiscent of the Metamorphosis. On one page, Merian’s botanical illustrations can be seen. However, Kaersenhout has altered the drawings: they appear to be smeared with paint. The peacock flower is almost entirely covered by a layer of blue, while splashes of paint envelop the contours of the plant. In this work, the colour blue, like green, symbolises the Earth and water: what everyone needs to survive and what every human being has a right to. Botanical illustrations can also be seen on the other page, but they are much lighter. On this lighter page, Kaersenhout has also depicted figures: women who seem to rise quite literally from the shadows of Merian’s drawings. The women are portrayed as fragile, almost transparent. But those who look closely will see them: smiling at the viewer, doing the laundry or holding a child in their arms. It sparks curiosity about the lives of these anonymous women: what did they think, how did they feel? One thing is certain: without them, Merian could never have become the scientist for whom she is still celebrated today.

The various layers in Of Palimpsests and Erasure are a metaphor for the complex system of inequality, exploitation and oppression surrounding Merian. Kaersenhout herself says of this: ‘The layers are like a galaxy of meanings. The women’s bodies ‘disrupt’ a dominant history, as it were, while simultaneously claiming a place in a history that has actively erased them. If the viewer approaches the works from a one-sided, hierarchical perspective, the work will not reveal itself.’

Kaersenhout also reflects Merian’s complex, dual status in the title of her work: while Erasure means ‘wiping out’, referring to the women behind Merian who were ‘erased’, a palimpsest is a manuscript or document that has been erased or scraped clean so that the paper can be reused. Today, many historical texts on palimpsests are recovered using ultraviolet light and other modern techniques. Thus, rather than tracing an origin or evolution, a palimpsest can trace the erasure of different cultures. Kaersenhout seems to be aiming for the same effect with her work: anyone who sheds new light on the history and work of Maria Sibylla Merian will discover that she was supported by many important women who were later erased from history, their knowledge used and reused by Merian.