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The Return of the Herd
Jean Honoré Fragonard French
Not on view
In the twelve years between his two Italian journeys, Fragonard became enamored of the Dutch landscape, which he knew through both paintings and visits to the Low Countries. In a rustic echo of the aristocrats who pursue love in formal gardens in other works, a cattle herder here makes overtures to a peasant girl as they bring the animals home at the end of the day. While the windmill might evoke Dutch art, the sparkling effect of the brushwork is distinctly Fragonard’s, with its wide repertoire of marks, from broad areas of translucent wash to crisp strokes that delineate grasses in the foreground.
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