The Hay Wagon

In 1781 Joshua Reynolds, president of the Royal Academy in London, toured Flanders and Holland and wrote up what he saw. When he reached Prince William V's gallery in The Hague, the first pictures he listed were the Wouwermans. In the 18th century no royal collection felt complete without a few, and prices show it. At a sale in The Hague in 1737 this small panel fetched 680 guilders, well over a year's pay for a skilled craftsman then. It passed through two more Hague collections, those of Willem Lormier and Govert van Slingelandt, before reaching the prince. Hunting parties, rural scenes and above all horses were what made Wouwerman popular, and The Hay Wagon is one of the rural ones. The Mauritshuis owns it, and it hangs in the Gallery Prince Willem V.