Describe symbolism in Ways of Seeing by John Berger

Holbein's painting, The Ambassadors, portrays its characters as aloof and wary, while they are surrounded by the material goods and symbols of their world, which belie their confidence, formality, and arrogance. The navigation instruments between them symbolize trade routes to acquire the riches of other nations, a world globe as their target to colonize, and an African to symbolize the slave trade.