Wagen met twee kleine trekpaarden after 1604

This drawing of a wagon with two small draft horses was made by Paulus Willemsz. van Vianen, around the turn of the 17th century. The scene depicts a mundane aspect of early modern life in the Netherlands. Horses like these would have been a common sight, performing essential labor in agriculture and transport. The drawing is simple, unadorned, and direct, which seems to reflect the growing cultural prominence of the Dutch middle class, who valued this type of unpretentious realism over idealized or allegorical depictions. It also marks a shift in the status of the artist. No longer just anonymous craftsmen, artists were becoming public figures with their own styles and recognizable oeuvres. Drawings such as this are like workshop notes: a record of daily life and experiments with technique. To fully understand the meaning of this drawing, we need to consider the economic and social conditions of the Netherlands at the time. Scholarly sources, such as tax records, merchant ledgers, and guild records can help us better understand the life of Paulus Willemsz. van Vianen and the world that he inhabited.