A swan spreads its wings and hisses at a dog swimming toward its nest. Jan Asselijn painted it around 1650 as a life-size nature scene.

Later someone added words that turned it into politics: the swan became the Dutch statesman Johan de Witt, one egg was labeled “Holland,” and the dog “enemy of the state.” In 1800 it was the very first painting bought for the national art gallery that became the Rijksmuseum.