Oil on canvas, 38cm by 155cm. Pair to PIC349.
This painting, and its pair PIC349, had been acquired by the 9th Earl of Exeter by 1777. An old inscription on the stretcher mentions that both paintings were acquired from the Palazzo Massimi in Rome as by Nicolas Poussin.
Claude Lorrain was born in France, but spent most of his working life in Italy. He became known for his landscape painting, though the themes of his canvases were generally either mythic or religious, rather than purely aesthetic, in keeping with the sensibilities of the age.
