Aelbert Cuyp (Dutch, 1620-91)

Herdsmen with Cows Oil on canvas (99 x 144cm) Painted in Dordrecht around 1660

All landscape painters must to some extent choose between object and light, between the earth and the sky. Cuyp chooses sky. To give it due prominence he adopts the lowest possible view-point, so that even the nearby cows project above the horizon. Nothing is seen for itself: everything is affected by the quality of the light striking it. Even the weeds, stumps and grasses of the foreground are lit up in strange patterns by the slanting light of the setting sun. Beyond the foreground ridge we see veils of glowing misty air, through which we have to peer to make out the river and distant mountains. Colour is again dictated by light. There is a ring of coloured air surrounding the sun, almost like a rainbow, which extends over the earth as well as the sky. The setting here is not specific, but it is more Dutch than Italian. Cuyp wishes to show how light transforms even an ordinary, local scene.