Silvio with the Wounded Dorinda

Louis Vallée took his subject from Giovanni Battista Guarini's late sixteenth-century tragicomedy Il Pastor Fido, a pastoral play that glorified arcadian life and had far-ranging effects on the art and literature of France, Flanders, and the Netherlands. Its extremely intricate plot focuses on the love between the faithful shepherd Mirtillo and the nymph Amarillis, who is betrothed to Silvio by paternal arrangement. This scene is from the play’s subplot, which concentrates on the love of the nymph Dorinda for Silvio, who cares only for the hunt and is oblivious to her feelings. After one of Silvio’s arrows accidentally wounds Dorinda, she crawls out from the bushes where she had been hiding in her animal-skin disguise and falls into the arms of her guardian, Linco. Silvio, distraught and finally realizing his own love for Dorinda, offers her the arrow so that she can exact revenge by taking his life in return. Dorinda, whose wound is only superficial, wisely rejects his emotional offer so that all ends well. The two lovers are married before sunset that very day.

Silvio with the Wounded Dorinda is an excellent example of Dutch classicism as it developed in Amsterdam around mid-century. History paintings such as this work were greatly admired and avidly collected by Amsterdam patricians. Almost nothing is known about the life of the artist Louis Vallée. Unfortunately, the first and only document that refers specifically to him is the register that records his burial in Amsterdam’s Oude Kerk on May 28, 1653.