Zee met vissersschepen 1819 - 1866

Louis Meijer made this pencil drawing, called ‘Sea with Fishing Vessels’, sometime in the mid-19th century. It depicts a handful of fishing boats struggling against a strong sea. The image has a documentary quality, as if capturing a slice of everyday life in the Netherlands. But it also hints at the sheer difficulty of working on the water, the vulnerability of the fishermen, and their dependence on forces beyond their control. In that period, fishing communities were often tight-knit and devout, with strong social hierarchies and religious beliefs. The fishermen would have been connected to the wider market economy through merchants and traders based in the coastal cities. The institutional art world, meanwhile, was rapidly developing in the Netherlands, with new museums, galleries, and art schools promoting a national school of painting. To better understand this drawing, we can turn to archives of maritime history and social studies of Dutch fishing communities. These materials provide context and open up new ways of appreciating the artwork.