Twee mannen met manden en de portretten van T. Bianchi en G. van Rooyen 1809

Jacob Ernst Marcus created this print, ‘Two Men with Baskets and the Portraits of T. Bianchi and G. van Rooyen,’ sometime in the early nineteenth century. It presents us with an intriguing combination of social types and portraiture in the Netherlands. On the one hand, we have studies of working-class figures with their baskets, possibly rendered from life. On the other, we find portraits of presumably middle-class men, identifiable by name. The contrast invites questions about the social function of art at the time, and its role in representing different strata of society. The relative formality of the portraits seems at odds with the casual depiction of the basket carriers. How might the relationship between these images reflect or comment on the social hierarchies of the time? The Rijksmuseum archives, alongside period publications, might shed light on the sitters’ identities, and the artist’s intentions. Art, after all, is always embedded in its social and institutional context.