Landscape with Milkmaid and Shepherd c. 1646

Editor: This is "Landscape with Milkmaid and Shepherd" painted by David Teniers the Younger around 1646. It’s an oil painting with a peaceful, almost idyllic feel. What’s your interpretation? Curator: For me, this painting is fascinating as a record of 17th-century modes of production and labor. It presents the *idea* of pastoral life, but let's think about the reality embedded in the materials. Oil paint, derived from pigments and linseed oil, signifies trade and craft. And the act of depicting a milkmaid points to agricultural labor, to a class often unseen, idealized, but entirely necessary for the economy of the time. Notice the quality of her clothing: how does that contrast to what we assume would be typical garments worn while performing that work? Editor: I see what you mean! It does feel like it's not showing the full story. Does that tension relate to why the artist chose oil paint for such a mundane scene, instead of, say, focusing on more 'high art' subject matter like portraits of nobility or grand religious events? Curator: Exactly! Think about who was consuming art like this. Urban bourgeoisie perhaps? A market eager to consume images that romanticized the very rural labor they relied on, maybe even profited from? These landscapes became commodities themselves, objects to possess that obscure their own entanglement with labor. Editor: That’s such a compelling idea – the painting as a product hiding other products. So much more than just a pretty picture of the countryside! Curator: Indeed. Reflecting on the role materials and artistic labor play in constructing and marketing an image encourages a new perspective of social-economical critique of the Baroque era.