This sensual and mysterious painting is an outstanding baroque rendition of a classical pastoral theme by the German-born painter Johann Liss. Prior to his untimely death in 1631 at the age of thirty-four, Liss was undoubtedly one of the most talented artists working in the Netherlands and across Italy during the opening decades of the seventeenth century. Representing an amalgam of styles and influences inspired by frequent travel across the Continent, this painting is particularly indebted to the Italian painters Annibale Carracci (1560-1609) and Correggio (active by 1514-1534).¹ Rediscovered in a private collection in 1997 and identified as a work by Liss soon thereafter in Rüdiger Klessmann's 1999 catalogue raisonné, Nymph and Shepherd represents a significant addition to the painter's oeuvre.

A serene sleeping nymph lies in a grove of twisting tree roots and branches. A shepherd peers over a branch to observe her, while another figure points the way through the darkness. Enough light has found its way through the thicket to illuminate the slumbering woodland creature. The influences evident in this composition are remarkably varied, a feature that is one of Liss’s artistic hallmarks. The knotty woodland setting shows an awareness of the landscapes of the Fleming Paul Bril (circa 1554-1626), who was active in Rome at the same time as Liss. The sleeping nymph, however, derives from the contorted nudes produced by Correggio a century earlier. Liss may well have had the opportunity to see the artist's Satyr and Nymph with Cupid, now in the Musée du Louvre, Paris, which had been in the Gonzaga collection in Mantua during the painter's time in Italy (fig. 1).² The treatment of light and atmospheric setting derive from Annibale Carracci while the Rubensian treatment of flesh recalls the sensual approach of Flemish painters. In synthesizing these various sources of influence, Liss effectively harmonizes what might otherwise be competing elements.

As discovered by Dorothy Limouze, the painting depicts a portion of the composition of a drawing by Aegidius Sadeler II (1568-1625) that is signed and dated 1615, today in the State Hermitage Museum, Saint Petersburg (fig. 2).³ The comparison between them, coupled with recent technical analysis indicates that approximately one-third of the original canvas at the right edge was cropped, probably no earlier than the eighteenth century. A very similar painting of Bathing Nymphs in the Städtischen Kunstsammlungen, Augsburg (fig. 3), was connected much earlier with a corresponding Sadeler drawing in the Louvre, Paris.⁴ Both paintings have identical wax collectors’ stamps on their versos (an escutcheon bearing two rings, topped by a crown).

Although the chronology of Liss’s few surviving works remains difficult to establish with certainty, the present painting can be tentatively be dated to 1625, when the artist was working in Rome. The date of the Saint Petersburg drawing makes it too early to have been copied after a Liss painting, as 1615 was the year Liss left Oldenburg as a journeyman. Sadeler, who was court engraver to the preeminent patron Emperor Rudolf II Habsburg, was active as a painter and draftsman. In her dissertation and subsequent research, Limouze provides evidence that Sadeler welcomed young artists visiting Prague, often giving them his prints and drawings.⁵

Conjecture remains regarding the subject's correct identification. Klessmann interpreted the scene as depicting Cymon and Iphigena as recounted in Boccaccio's Decameron. This tale surrounds the discovery of the beautiful Iphigena by Cymon, a young man born into wealth who rejects his station in order to become a shepherd. As recounted by the poet, Cymon's encounter inspires a life transformation in order to be worthy of such a maiden. Furthermore, Klessmann interpreted the scene's woodland setting, and prominent red butterfly in the lower right corner, as representative of Cymon's transformation. Further comparisons have also been made with a contemporary engraving by Jacob Matham (1571-1631).⁶

This interpretation has been contested more recently by the scholar Joshua P. Waterman, who cast doubt on the composition's adherence to the Bocaccio tale.⁷ The cropping of the painted composition likely eliminated certain narrative elements, the awakened nymph and goats shown on the right side of Sadeler's drawing, among them. Based on this, Waterman infers that the scene cannot depict Cymon and Iphigena, as the additional figures do not accord with the episode from the Decameron. Alternatively, Waterman suggested the subject is a generic sylvan scene, derived from the contemporary taste for pastoral representations. Such subject matter is also found in art from the Imperial Court in Prague.⁸

We are grateful to Professor Dorothy Limouze for her assistance preparing this catalogue note.

¹Klessmann 1999, p. 161.

² Oil on canvas, 188 by 230 cm. Paris, Musée du Louvre.

³ As communicated in 2005 by Dorothy Limouze to Keith Christiansen and Walter Liedtke, then curators at the Metropolitan Museum of Art.

⁴ Klessmann 1999, pp. 159-160, cat. no. 26, reproduced. Grey ink and wash, white heightening over black chalk on paper, 35 by 47 cm. Citing earlier scholars, Klessmann identified the drawing as a copy after the Augsburg painting. However, that relationship was first questioned by Richard Spear and discussed at more length by Dorothy Limouze in her doctoral dissertation on Sadeler. See R. Spear, “Johann Liss Reconsidered,” Art Bulletin LVIII (1976), pp. 589-590, and D. Limouze, “Aegidius Sadeler,” Ph.D. dissertation, Princeton University 1990, pp. 310-315. Limouze is preparing an article on the two paintings and the related drawings, and these will also be discussed in her forthcoming book on Sadeler’s drawings.

⁵ Information provided by Dorothy Limouze.

⁶ Klessmann 1999, p. 80; reproduced fig. 78.

⁷ Waterman's 2012 catalogue note for this painting was commissioned by the Metropolitan Museum of Art and can be consulted on request.

⁸ This suggestion was made by Waterman.