Artwork
Landscape with Diana and Actaeon
Landscape with Diana and Actaeon is an oil painting by the High Baroque Italian artist Carlo Maratta. It dates from 1667 and is held in the collection of the Hermitage Museum.
About this work
Subject & Meaning
The landscape elements, trees, cliffs, and water, are integral to the narrative, framing the bathing site where the encounter unfolds.
The painting depicts the mythological episode of Diana and Actaeon, drawn from Ovid's Metamorphoses. According to the sources, the work shows Diana alongside her nymphs and Callisto in a bathing site by a watercourse, set within a wooded landscape of trees and cliffs. The scene captures the moment of the goddess's encounter with the hunter Actaeon, who came upon her while she bathed.
The combination of nude bathers, nymphs, and the natural setting reflects the standard iconography of the Diana and Actaeon myth, in which the goddess transforms the intruder as punishment for his transgression. The landscape elements, trees, cliffs, and water, are integral to the narrative, framing the bathing site where the encounter unfolds.
Technique & Style
Landscape with Diana and Actaeon is executed in oil paint on canvas, a standard support for Italian Baroque easel painting of the period. The work measures 198 cm in height by 151 cm in width, a substantial vertical format that accommodates the integration of towering cliffs, dense tree masses, and the bathing scene below. The painting is attributed jointly to Carlo Maratta and Gaspard Dughet, combining Maratta's figure work with Dughet's landscape handling, a collaborative division of labor characteristic of seventeenth-century Italian practice.
The composition unites mythological narrative with idealized landscape, balancing figural groups against naturalistic elements such as watercourses, trees, and rocky outcrops. The canvas is held in the Hermitage Museum collection, where its condition and stylistic features can be assessed directly.
History & Provenance
Landscape with Diana and Actaeon was created in 1667 in Italy as an oil painting on canvas. The work is attributed to both Carlo Maratta and Gaspard Dughet, reflecting a collaborative effort between the two artists during the mid-17th century. Measuring 198 cm in height and 151 cm in width, the piece belongs to the genres of landscape and mythological painting.
While the specific commission details and early ownership chain are not documented in the available records, the artwork is currently held in the collection of the Hermitage Museum. The painting depicts the mythological narrative of Diana and Actaeon within a naturalistic setting featuring cliffs, trees, and a watercourse, consistent with the landscape tradition of the period.
Context
Carlo Maratta's 1667 oil on canvas, titled Landscape with Diana and Actaeon, exemplifies the Baroque synthesis of classical myth and idealized scenery. Art historians view the work as a culmination of Maratta’s mastery of figure composition within a naturalistic landscape, reflecting the period’s interest in mythological subjects that could convey moral and allegorical themes. The painting’s dynamic arrangement of Diana, Actaeon, and attendant nymphs within a meticulously rendered terrain underscores the artist’s influence on later academic easel paintings.
Its inclusion in the Hermitage collection has facilitated extensive scholarly analysis, positioning it as a key example of 17th‑century mythological landscape painting.
Overview
Carlo Maratta's 1667 oil painting, Landscape with Diana and Actaeon, depicts a dramatic scene from classical mythology. This work, characteristic of the High Baroque period in Italy, integrates a narrative of divine encounter within an expansive natural setting. It is currently housed in the collection of the State Hermitage Museum.
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Artist & collection
Artist
Carlo Maratta or Maratti (18 May 1625 – 15 December 1713) was an Italian Baroque painter and draughtsman, active principally in Rome where he was the leading painter in the second half of the 17th century.
