Voorzijde en zijkant van een bed, beide met een hemel c. 1780

Here we see an anonymous drawing of a bed, rendered in pen and watercolor. Its design—high headboard, ornate carvings, and what looks like rich textiles—suggests it was intended for someone of considerable means. Think about the cultural weight of the bed in this time. Beyond mere furniture, it was a stage for life’s most intimate and consequential acts: birth, lovemaking, and death. To have such a bed was to announce one’s status, an emblem of power and lineage. Who would have slept in this bed? What stories of social life, of family, of inheritance would it have silently witnessed? The artist leaves us only with a blueprint, never revealing who would lay their head here. This invites us to ponder the lives of those who occupied these spaces, and the complex web of social relations that such an object embodies.