Two Shepherds in a Rocky Landscape
Salomon Gessner
1764
Medium
etching on laid paper tinted pale blue
Dimensions
plate: 20.6 x 18.8 cm (8 1/8 x 7 3/8 in.) sheet: 29.5 x 25.9 cm (11 5/8 x 10 3/16 in.)
Classification
Department
CG-E
Museum
National Gallery of Art, Washington, D.C.
Credit
Ailsa Mellon Bruce Fund
Accession Number
1996.12.7
About the Artist
Salomon Gessner · 1730–1788
Salomon Gessner was born in Zurich in 1730 into a family of printers and publishers, an upbringing that placed books, images, and ideas at the center of his world from an early age. Though largely self-taught as a visual artist, he received some instruction during a period in Berlin, where he encountered the German Rococo tradition, and his mature work reflects a deep absorption in the pastoral li...