Aelbert Cuyp, 'Peasants and Cattle by the River Merwede', about 1658-60

It is the animals which take centre stage in this picture. On a grassy riverside knoll, four cows and a magnificent jet black horse are spotlit by the warm afternoon sun. Aelbert Cuyp was a brilliant painter of these beasts, especially cattle. He knew exactly how to convey their languor and ponderous bearing, how the light would catch their heavy, rippling hides and the tufted fringes on the powerful ridgeline of their backs.

Being ponderous animals, cows do not strike many poses. You can paint them lowering their heads to graze or lifting their heads to low. You can depict them lying down, standing up, turning their heads; side on, head on, from behind. But that’s about it. So Cuyp worked by perfecting a series of these postures and often repeated them in his paintings. Indeed some of these cows appear in other pictures in our collection – the one on the far left and the cow standing and viewed head on both appear in A Distant View of Dordrecht, with a Milkmaid and Four Cows, and Other Figures (‘The Large Dort’), for example.

There are several reasons why cows feature so prominently in Cuyp’s pictures. The seventeenth century had seen increasing reclamation of flooded land, especially around Dordrecht, Cuyp’s home town. The distant castle here, outlined in the golden haze on the far side of the river to the left, is the ruined castle of Merwede, about a mile to the east of Dordrecht. It dates from the thirteenth century and a part of one of the walls still stands today.

The damp, low-lying pasture around here was much better for grazing cattle than sheep, and farmers had quickly learned to exploit this, improving both breeding stock and feeding practice and hence productivity. Cheese and butter were key exports and cattle had come to symbolise wealth and peaceful prosperity. Many of Cuyp’s rich Dordrecht-based clients would have had an interest in dairy farming or have owned land and property in the countryside near the city.

It may be that the gentleman on his horse depicted here reflects this kind of proprietorial interest. But, like the cows, it is another motif which Cuyp often incorporated into his landscapes. The image of a horseman who has stopped to survey the scene and chat with a herdsman or maid usually works both as a visual device, drawing us into the view, and, perhaps, a social comment, confirming the harmony of an established social order. Here, however, the feeling is a little different. The two cowherds do not engage with the mounted rider – perhaps they are even gossiping about him. He has his back to them and, instead of taking in the prospect across the water, he looks out of the picture towards an unseen view in another direction. We can’t ignore his presence, however: his dark outline against the grey clouds forms a dramatic intervention between the warm, soporific colours of the cattle and the golden glow of the sky.