Landscape with Shepherd Playing a Flute (1638): Art, History and Details

Landscape with Shepherd Playing a Flute (1638) is in the Cleveland Museum of Art collection. The museum's creator attribution is Schelte Adamsz. Bolswert (Flemish, about 1586–1659); Peter Paul Rubens (Flemish, 1577–1640); Gillis Hendricx (undetermined, 1570-1700).

The work and its context

The museum's open-access catalogue describes the work:

Peter Paul Rubens collaborated with, among others, engraver Schelte Adamsz. Bolswert, building on the techniques established by Lucas Emil Vorsterman. To replicate one of Rubens’s painted landscapes, Bolswert covered every inch of the copperplate with a dense network of crossed lines, applying discipline and consistency to create a dramatic, tenebrist (extreme dark/light contrast) scene. In these and other works, Rubens’s engravers attempted to conceal the individual lines of engraving in favor of effects that mimicked painting.

Object facts

• Title: Landscape with Shepherd Playing a Flute
• Date: 1638
• Creator attribution: Schelte Adamsz. Bolswert (Flemish, about 1586–1659); Peter Paul Rubens (Flemish, 1577–1640); Gillis Hendricx (undetermined, 1570-1700)
• Culture: Flanders
• Type: Print
• Technique: engraving
• Dimensions: Platemark: 32 x 46.2 cm (12 5/8 x 18 3/16 in.); Sheet: 37.3 x 54.7 cm (14 11/16 x 21 9/16 in.)
• Collection: PR - Engraving
• Department: Prints
• Accession number: 1991.247

Collection credit

Gift of Louise S. Richards

View the collection record

See the museum's photographs and full catalogue entry. Catalogue text is reproduced from the Cleveland Museum of Art's open-access data, with HTML formatting removed. This object and its supplied image are designated CC0.