245 'THE SHEPHERDESS'
by Johann Baptist Hofner (1832 - 1913)

This gentle sunbrowned shepherdess is little more than a child. Cradling this tiny lamb in her blue overskirt as she would her much-loved doll, she regards the worried ewe with indulgence, as if saying "your newborn is safe in my arms".

How truly to life Hofner paints the silky legs and the soft woollen coat of the lamb. We feel the heat of the day seeing the sultry sky and the rest of the flock beneath the shady bushes. The lamb, a supreme symbol of innocence, is borne aloft above a bush of wild roses, both symbols of love. The young shepherdess is a child of nature but carefully groomed, her long plait of hair hanging down her back. She treads confidently on her strong bare feet, perfectly at home on the mountain pasture.

Such a representational picture of nature appealed greatly to the Victorians living in the industrialised towns, unable to be as acquainted with the country as people are nowadays. But, even today, its innocence, naturalness and beauty have great charm.

Johann Baptist Hofner was a painter of animals and genre scenes. Born in Southern Germany in 1832, he studied with Piloty and lived in Munich, where he died in 1913. He exhibited in Munich and Vienna from 1863. "The Shepherdess" was painted in 1866.