In the exhibition Quadrant: Four themes of Petrus van der Velden (20 October 2006 – 25 March 2007) this work appeared with the following label: This study was at some point removed from Van der Velden’s Sumner sketchbook, and is likely to have been completed in 1890 shortly after his arrival in Christchurch. The farmer bends over the plough, driving it through the earth as it is pulled along by the pair of horses. As with his Dutch beet pickers in Gathering Beet, Village of Rijnsburg, Van der Velden here focuses on the physical nature of the work being carried out. Movement is suggested through a lively use of line, which he has then worked over with shading to create subtle tonal contrasts.

See Gathering Beet, Village of Rijnsburg