The Spinner and Four Cows 

Herman van Swanevelt made this etching, "The Spinner and Four Cows," in the mid-seventeenth century. The etching portrays an idealised landscape with a woman spinning, cows resting, and a waterfall cascading down rocks. Swanevelt was part of a community of Dutch and Flemish artists working in Rome who drew inspiration from the Italian countryside. At the time, the Roman Campagna was a popular subject for landscape painters, both local and foreign. The cultural context in which this etching was produced, and the rise of landscape painting in general, is related to the growth of an urban art market catering to an increasingly wealthy merchant class. These landscape paintings presented an idealized vision of rural life. Art historians might investigate 17th-century travelogues, economic records, and estate inventories to gain deeper insights into the social conditions that shaped this type of imagery. We must always be attentive to the forces that shape artistic production.