Bissekræmmeren og hans hund 1843

Johan Thomas Lundbye made this drawing, "The peddler and his dog," using pen and brown ink, probably in the 1840s. At the time, Denmark was an agricultural society, but its urban centers were beginning to grow, and class divisions were solidifying. It shows a traveling salesman with his cart and dog resting next to a stone mile marker. Lundbye was interested in the lives of ordinary people. Here he depicts the rural working class through a figure that would have been a common sight on Danish country roads. We see the life of a common tradesman, who is somewhere between the country and the town. This image prompts us to consider the social conditions that shaped artistic production in 19th-century Denmark, and how artists like Lundbye contributed to the formation of a national identity. Research into the period's economic and social history can help us better understand the context in which this work was created and viewed. The interpretation of art is contingent on social and institutional contexts.