Artwork
Landscape with herdsmen and cattle
Landscape with herdsmen and cattle is an oil painting by the Dutch Golden Age artist Dirck van der Bergen. It dates from 1690 and is held in the collection of the Rijksmuseum.
About this work
Subject & Meaning
The work is likely intended as a pendant to another piece titled Landscape with Fighting Bulls, sharing similar dimensions and provenance.
The painting depicts an Italianate landscape featuring a barefoot young shepherd who has gathered his cattle around an ancient fountain. A prominent narrative element occurs on the right, where a shepherd holds a cow by the horns while a bull mounts her. This scene is executed in the tradition of the Italianisanten, a group of Northern European artists who specialized in imaginary Italian views, despite the artist Dirck van Bergen never having visited Italy.
The specific motif of the bull mounting the cow also appears in works by the Haarlem Italianist Nicolaes Berchem. The work is likely intended as a pendant to another piece titled Landscape with Fighting Bulls, sharing similar dimensions and provenance.
Technique & Style
Executed in oil paint on canvas, this work measures 35 by 48 centimeters. The composition depicts an Italianate landscape featuring a barefoot young herder gathering cattle around an ancient fountain. A specific narrative element appears on the right, where a bull mounts a cow while the herder restrains the female animal by her horns.
Stylistically, the painting adheres to the tradition of the Italianisanten, a group of Northern European artists who specialized in idealized southern scenery, despite the creator likely never visiting Italy. This particular motif of animal coupling echoes subjects found in the oeuvre of Nicolaes Berchem. The artist signed the work 'D.V.D.Bergen.' in the lower right area, slightly off-center.
History & Provenance
The work titled Landscape with herdsmen and cattle was painted by Dirck van der Bergen in 1680 using oil on canvas. It belongs to the landscape genre and was created in the tradition of the Italianate painters, although Van der Bergen never traveled to Italy; the motif of a bull mounting a cow also appears in the works of Nicolaes Berchem. The painting is signed 'D.V.D.Bergen' in the lower right and was likely produced between 1660 and 1690. It entered the collection of the Rijksmuseum in Amsterdam in 1815.
The painting is held by the Rijksmuseum in Amsterdam. It was acquired by the Rijksmuseum in 1815. No inventory or accession number is recorded in the available sources, and no exhibition history is documented.
The work has been associated with a pendant, Landscape with fighting bulls, which shares roughly the same dimensions and provenance, though that companion piece is itself not detailed here.
Context
Dirck van der Bergen’s Landscape with herdsmen and cattle is situated within the Dutch Italianate tradition, where Northern painters adopted Italianate motifs without traveling to Italy. The composition’s staged herd behavior and antique fountain align with works by Nicolaes Berchem, a prominent Haarlem Italianisant, indicating Bergen’s engagement with this contemporary idiom rather than direct Italian experience. Scholarship notes the painting’s likely pairing with a pendant of similar dimensions, Landscape with fighting bulls, reinforcing its function within the period’s pendant culture.
Critical reception has emphasized the work’s adherence to established formulas of the Italianisant landscape, with the motif of the mounting bull treated as a conventional pastoral trope rather than a literal observation. The painting’s inclusion in the Rijksmuseum’s 1815 acquisition reflects early institutional recognition of Bergen’s place within Dutch landscape painting, though sustained scholarly attention remains comparatively limited compared to his more famous contemporaries.
Overview
Landscape with herdsmen and cattle is an oil painting by Dirck van der Bergen, dated to 1690, and is part of the Rijksmuseum's collection.
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