Soldiers Loading Barges for a Large Sailing Ship Along the Coast

Soldiers Loading Barges for a Large Sailing Ship Along the Coast

Dirk Langendijk

An item at Metropolitan Museum of Art

Langendijk portrays the waterfront as a site where members of different classes converge. The officers or gentlemen at center are juxtaposed with the laborers struggling to load packs onto mules; the fishermen taking account of their catch in the foreground; and the impoverished woman and children at right.

Drawings and Prints

An exhibit at Metropolitan Museum of Art

Soldiers Loading Barges for a Large Sailing Ship Along the CoastSoldiers Loading Barges for a Large Sailing Ship Along the CoastSoldiers Loading Barges for a Large Sailing Ship Along the CoastSoldiers Loading Barges for a Large Sailing Ship Along the CoastSoldiers Loading Barges for a Large Sailing Ship Along the Coast

The Department’s vast collection of works on paper comprises approximately 21,000 drawings, 1.2 million prints, and 12,000 illustrated books created in Europe and the Americas from about 1400 to the present day. Since its foundation in 1916, the Department has been committed to collecting a wide range of works on paper, which includes both pieces that are incredibly rare and lauded for their aesthetic appeal, as well as material that is more popular, functional, and ephemeral. The broad scope of the department’s collecting encourages questions of connoisseurship as well as those pertaining to function and context, and demonstrates the vital role that prints, drawings, and illustrated books have played throughout history.