Herdsmen Tending Cattle
Aelbert Cuyp1655/1660
National Gallery of Art, Washington DC
Washington, DC, United States
Aelbert Cuyp’s painting of herdsmen and cattle along a river with an evocative ruin in the background is more pastoral than agricultural in its associations. In this respect it parallels a rich literary tradition glorifying the values of rural life. The herdsman in the bright red jacket seems to be getting his cows ready to return to the farmstead, if only he can convince his female companion to abandon this lovely spot on the riverbank.
Many of the components of this work—the golden light, the atmospheric character of the distant landscape with its dramatic ruins, the diffused golden light that casts long shadows, the abstract shapes of the rocks and branches in the foreground—show the influence of the Italianate style of Jan Both (1615/1618–1652) and other Dutch artists who had worked in Italy.
Details
- Title: Herdsmen Tending Cattle
- Creator: Aelbert Cuyp
- Date Created: 1655/1660
- Physical Dimensions: overall: 66 x 87.6 cm (26 x 34 1/2 in.) framed: 88.9 x 109.9 x 3.8 cm (35 x 43 1/4 x 1 1/2 in.)
- Provenance: Possibly Gerard Vandergucht [1696-1776], London, c. 1750; possibly (his sale, London, 1757, no. 66); Jennens,[1] possibly for Henry Penton [d. 1806], London;[2] (his sale, Skinner & Dyke, London, 10 June 1800, no. 49); Sir Henry Paulet St. John-Mildmay, 3rd bt. [1764-1808], Dogmersfield House, Hampshire; by inheritance to his wife, Lady Jane St. John-Mildmay [c. 1765-1857], Dogmersfield House; by inheritance to her grandson, Sir Henry Bouverie Paulet St. John-Mildmay, 5th bt. [1810-1902], Dogmersfield House; by inheritance to his son, Sir Henry Paulet St. John-Mildmay, 6th bt. [1853-1916], Dogmersfield House; (M. Knoedler & Co., New York), from 1902; sold April 1905 to Andrew W. Mellon, Pittsburgh and Washington, D.C.; deeded 28 December 1934 to The A.W. Mellon Educational and Charitable Trust, Pittsburgh; gift 1937 to NGA. [1] The only source to mention Vandergucht (also written van der Gucht) is the Knoedler prospectus for the painting, in NGA curatorial files, which mistakenly lists the Vandergucht sale of 1777 that did not include any paintings by Cuyp. See instead Frank Simpson, “Dutch Paintings in England before 1760,” _The Burlington Magazine_ 95 (January 1953): 41, who lists a "Landscape with Cattle, etc." by Cuyp as being no. 66 in a 1757 Vandergucht sale in London, where it was bought by “Jennens.” The listing appears in one of two manuscript volumes in the Victoria and Albert Museum library, London, that contain transcripts of catalogues of the principal collections of paintings sold in England between 1711 and 1759. Jennens was likely Charles Jennens, whom Simpson describes as having brought together by the mid-eighteenth century the largest collection of Dutch paintings then in England. Without further description or size information in the transcription, however, it is not possible to know whether the painting in question is identical to _Herdsmen Tending Cattle_. [2] The Knoedler prospectus, in NGA curatorial files, says that Penton acquired the painting at the Vandergucht sale. Penton certainly owned the picture by 1760, the date on François Vivares’ reproductive engraving, entitled _The Evening_. It depicts the composition in reverse but, with the exception of a group of two birds, it is otherwise identical. This print is listed in Charles LeBlanc, _Manuel de l’amateur d’estampes_, 4 vols., Paris, 1854: 4:141, no. 20; and Andreas Andresen, _Handbuch für Kupferstichsammler..._, 2 vols., Leipzig, 1873: 2:678, no. 17.
- Medium: oil on canvas
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