Landscape with a Figure Herding Cattle Along a Road Beside a Cottage, a Hillside at Left, a Forest in the Valley Below at Right
Medium
Aquatint and soft-ground etching
Dimensions
Plate: 10 7/8 x 14 7/8 in. (27.7 x 37.8 cm) Sheet: 12 3/8 x 18 1/2 in. (31.5 x 47 cm)
Classification
Prints
Department
Drawings and Prints
Museum
Metropolitan Museum of Art, New York, NY
Credit
Harris Brisbane Dick Fund, 1933
Accession Number
33.7(7)
Tags
Art Historical Context
This enchanting landscape print, titled *Landscape with a Figure Her Cattle Along a Road Beside Cottage, a Hillside Left, a Forest in Valley Below at Right*, the serene English countryside around 1784–88. Attributed to both Thomas Rowlandson and Thomas Gainsborough—two luminaries of British art—it depicts a lone herdsman guiding cows along a winding road past a humble cottage, with rolling hills on one side and a dense forest on the other. The pastoral scene evokes the tranquility of rural life, a favorite theme for these artists during the late Enlightenment era. Printed in aquatint and soft...
About the Artist
Thomas Rowlandson|Thomas Gainsborough · 1756–1827
Thomas Rowlandson (1757–1827) was an English artist and caricaturist whose satirical watercolors and prints captured the social life of Georgian Britain with unparalleled wit and technical mastery. Alongside James Gillray, he is recognized as one of the greatest British graphic artists, and his distinctive flowing line and keen observations have made his work integral to understanding late 18th an...