NARRATOR:
Early morning sunlight softly filters through the trees and creates a mood of cool tranquility. Past a large tree with luxuriant foliage on the right, our gaze is drawn into the distance. Below, a piping shepherd guards his flock, his red stockings, blue pants and yellow shirt beautifully rendered against the rocky ground. On the left, set further back in space and silhouetted against the pale sky, are leafy trees, rocks and a small footbridge. Beyond, fertile plains blend into mountains blurred by the hazy atmosphere.
Landscape with a Piping Shepherd, painted about 1630, is one of the earliest known works by the French painter Claude Lorrain. Claude was one of the great masters of ideal landscape, an art that presented nature as more beautiful and harmonious than nature itself. The arrangement of forms in receding planes, with alternating bands of light and shade, recalls the art of the Venetian painters Giorgione and Titian. But Claude’s subtle, poetic rendering of light was uniquely his own. It emanates from the sky just above the horizon, and streams toward us in radiant waves.
Regarded as the “prince of landscape painters,” Claude exerted his influence until well into the 19th century. Uneducated and of humble origins, he pursued his artistic ambitions in Italy, working first as a servant, and then as an assistant to a noted Roman landscape painter. The Roman campagna, a countryside haunted with remains and associations of antiquity, was among his greatest sources of inspiration.
Landscape with a Piping Shepherd
c. 1629-32
Claude (Claude Gellée) Lorrain (French, 1600-1682)
On View
Born in France but working predominantly in Italy, Claude Lorrain was one of the preeminent landscape painters of the 17th century. His paintings, which often blend pastoral or biblical scenes with majestic views, were popular with collectors across Europe for their calming effects and timeless themes.
Many of Claude’s landscapes are characterized by a subtle treatment of atmosphere and light. In this bucolic scene, the morning sun rises on a piping shepherd and his flock. They are illuminated by bright highlights that distinguish them sharply against the shadowy woods. Landscapes like this one reward a patient observer, who may spot small creatures, soaring birds and hidden figures in the scene. These minutely painted details are balanced by far-reaching views of the valley floor beyond.
Details
- Artist Name: Claude (Claude Gellée) Lorrain (French, 1600-1682)
- Title: Landscape with a Piping Shepherd
- Date: c. 1629-32
- Medium: Oil on canvas
- Dimensions: 25-3/4 x 37-1/2 in. (65.4 x 95.3 cm)
- Credit Line: Norton Simon Art Foundation
- Accession Number: M.2007.3.P
- Copyright: © Norton Simon Art Foundation
Object Information
William Sloane Stanley, London; by 1828, ?by inheritance to his wife;
Mrs. Sloane Stanley, Portland Place (sale, London, Christie's, 21 April 1888, lot 8, as A woody landscape with figures and animals on a road, for gns. 42 to);
Martin Colnaghi.
Earl of Midleton, Peper Harow, London.
[Frank T. Sabin, London, sold 1947 to];
[Newhouse Galleries, New York, stock no. 14206, sold 1947 to];
Kimbell Art Foundation, Fort Worth, Texas, sold 4 May 1967 to;
[Newhouse Galleries, New York, consigned 7 October 1968 to];
[Frederick Mont, New York, returned 9 October 1968 to];
[Newhouse Galleries, New York, stock no. 17820, offered 1 May 1969 and subsequently sold 5 June 1969 to];
The Norton Simon Foundation.
Mrs. Sloane Stanley, Portland Place (sale, London, Christie's, 21 April 1888, lot 8, as A woody landscape with figures and animals on a road, for gns. 42 to);
Martin Colnaghi.
Earl of Midleton, Peper Harow, London.
[Frank T. Sabin, London, sold 1947 to];
[Newhouse Galleries, New York, stock no. 14206, sold 1947 to];
Kimbell Art Foundation, Fort Worth, Texas, sold 4 May 1967 to;
[Newhouse Galleries, New York, consigned 7 October 1968 to];
[Frederick Mont, New York, returned 9 October 1968 to];
[Newhouse Galleries, New York, stock no. 17820, offered 1 May 1969 and subsequently sold 5 June 1969 to];
The Norton Simon Foundation.
[on loan]
- London, British Institution, 1828 to
[on loan]
- Los Angeles County Museum of Art, 1969-11-14 to
[on loan]
- Phoenix, Phoenix Art Museum, 1969-08-18 to 1969-12-15
Nature Transformed
- Norton Simon Museum, 2004-10-08 to 2005-02-28
Reinstallation of Galleries: Art History of the 17th and 18th Century Gains Fresh Dimension
- Norton Simon Museum, 1993-09-02 to 1995-08-13
Three Centuries of French Art: Selections from The Norton Simon, Inc. Museum of Art and The Norton Simon Foundation_1
- California Palace of the Legion of Honor, 1973-05-03 to 1976-06-15
- Roethlisberger, Marcel, The Burlington Magazine, fig. 6 pp. 115-116
- Rosenberg, Pierre, France in the Golden Age: Seventeenth Century French Paintings in American Collections, fig. 1 p. 359
- Wright, Christopher, The French Painters of the Seventeenth Century, p. 164
- Röthlisberger, Marcel; and Doretta Cecchi, Tout l'oeuvre peint de Claude Lorrain, 1977, p. 86
- Morse, John D., Old Master Paintings in North America, 1979, p. 52
- Russell, H. Diane, Claude Lorrain 1600-1682, 1982, under no. 8
- Masterpieces from the Norton Simon Museum, 1989, p. 64
- Röthlisberger, Marcel, Revue de l'Art, 2004, fig. 14 pp. 54-60
- Campbell, Sara, Collector Without Walls: Norton Simon and His Hunt for the Best, 2010, cat. 638 p. 321
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