Flamenco school; second half of the 17th century.

Flamenco School; second half of the 17th century.
“Pastoral Scene.”
Oil on oak panel.
Shows signs of restoration.
Measurements: 46 x 51 cm; 65 x 71 cm (frame).
Oil on panel in a horizontal format, depicting a rural or pastoral scene. In the foreground, the artist places two figures accompanied by several sheep. The prominent presence of the landscape and the small size of the figures highlight the artist’s particular interest in capturing the landscape. It is worth noting that this was a period when the sentiment began to take hold that humans and nature should be complementary, each reflected in the other. In other words, the landscape was meant to evoke emotion and convey ideas. Thus, landscape painters like the artist of this painting sought to express their feelings through the landscape, rather than merely imitating it. This idea took shape through two main approaches: the dramatic, featuring turbulent and fantastical vistas, and the naturalistic, which emphasized images of a peaceful and serene nature, as in this case. It is this second approach that we see embodied in this work; the painter seeks to convey a religious reverence for the landscape—nature in its fullness, free from the industrial elements of modern life. In fact, the artist’s use of light here conveys a dreamlike atmosphere that invites the viewer to meditate and to contemplate themselves within the landscape. Landscape painting, however, encompasses a wide variety of styles that cannot be equated with one another; it does not affect all national schools equally, remaining more faithful to tradition in schools such as the Italian, French, or Dutch.
Undoubtedly, it was in the paintings of the Dutch school that the consequences of the region’s political emancipation, as well as the economic prosperity of the liberal bourgeoisie, were most openly manifested. The combination of the discovery of nature, objective observation, the study of the concrete, an appreciation of the everyday, a taste for the real and material, and a sensitivity to the seemingly insignificant led the Dutch artist to engage with the reality of daily life, without seeking any ideal alien to that very reality. The painter did not seek to transcend the present and the materiality of objective nature or to escape from tangible reality, but rather to immerse himself in it, to be intoxicated by it through the triumph of realism—a realism of pure illusory fiction, achieved thanks to a perfect and masterful technique and a conceptual subtlety in the lyrical treatment of light.