Rotterdam, fair on the Nieuwemarkt – Jan Anthonie Langendijk, 1804

“Fair on the Nieuwemarkt in Rotterdam”, drawing by Jan Anthonie Langendijk from 1804. Signed and dated lower left. Pen in grey and watercolour. Approx. 30.4 × 43 cm.

The Rotterdam fair is in full swing on the Nieuwemarkt. The street is filled with a colourful crowd of men, women and children playing among the stalls and various entertainments. On the left, a raised platform attracts considerable attention. Here a quack appears to be extracting a tooth, turning the procedure almost into a performance for the assembled crowd. In the foreground, meanwhile, people are laughing, drinking and engaged in animated conversation. According to the sign on the façade to the left the is “bier en jan(ever) te koop” [beer and gin for sale]. Along the right side of the market is a row of permanent stalls with broad awnings. Children and dogs move through the throng, while residents look down on the spectacle from the windows of the surrounding houses.

In the middle of the square, a circle of spectators has gathered around a bagpiper. Beside him walks a muzzled bear, accompanied by a man carrying a stick to keep the animal under control. The performance is clearly attracting the attention of the bystanders. Langendijk has filled the sheet with small incidents and observations; there is something to discover almost everywhere.

The Rotterdam fair was far more than simply a collection of amusements. It was both an annual market and a popular festival, with stallholders, performers and travelling companies spreading throughout large parts of the city. As many as five hundred stalls offering attractions, merchandise and novelties were said to have stretched through Rotterdam in a long succession.

The entertainments in 1804 were evidently spectacular as well. A nineteenth-century account of the Rotterdam fair mentions, among the attractions that year, a “grooten troup paardrijders en springers” [large troupe of equestrians and acrobats] and a “troup jonge draaddansers” [troupe of young tightrope walkers], scenes that were also drawn by Jan Anthonie Langendijk.

Jan Anthonie Langendijk (1780–1818) was the son and pupil of the Rotterdam draughtsman Dirk Langendijk. Father and son worked in such a similar manner that their drawings can sometimes be distinguished only by their signatures. In addition to military subjects, Jan Anthonie produced city views, markets and other scenes populated by large numbers of figures.

Here, an exact rendering of the topography seems subordinate to the narrative: the Nieuwemarkt serves above all as the stage for a lively panorama of everyday life in Rotterdam.

Price: Euro 7.500,- (incl. frame)