Description of the picture:
Cowgirl and Cowgirl – David Teniers the Younger. 1650s Canvas, oil. 58.4×52.5 (Cowgirl), 58.9×52.8 (Cowgirl)
The pastoral genre is in the Hermitage collection Teniers represented by paired paintings “Cowgirl” and “Cowgirl”, created by the master in the 1650s. Possessing individual, maybe even portrait, features, characters are at the same time represented in the roles proposed by the artist. In the hands of the shepherd is a pipe, the shepherd is depicted with tambourine. To the accompaniment of these musical instruments a shepherd’s dance was usually performed. Both paintings are associated with an allegory of Hearing.
Teniers with great enthusiasm, he wrote out not only the costumes and accessories necessary for the characters in their roles (staff, wreath, etc.), but also the landscape background. Both compositions harmoniously combine figures and landscape, the ideal person and his ideal environment. Only in the background in each of the paintings is there a Brower person – an ugly shepherd whose image is resolved in a grotesque plan."