Man met wandelstok 1839 - 1894

This is a light pencil sketch titled "Man Met Wandelstok," made by Lambertus Lingeman, a Dutch artist who lived in the 19th century. The delicate lines depict a man with a walking stick, a common sight in the urban landscapes of the time. The Netherlands in the 1800s was a society undergoing significant social and economic changes. As cities grew and new social classes emerged, the figure of a man with a walking stick could signify different things - it could be a symbol of bourgeois respectability, a sign of leisure, or perhaps even a marker of social exclusion for those who depended on it due to age or infirmity. The sketch itself, seemingly casual and unassuming, hints at the institutional context of artistic production. Was this a preliminary study for a larger work? A quick observation jotted down in a sketchbook? Historians might look to Lingeman's other works, exhibition records, and social networks to better understand the place of this sketch within the broader art world of the time. The meaning of this simple drawing, like all art, is contingent on its social and institutional context.