Valckenborch’s Spring, aka Frühlingslandschaft (Mai), depicts the new season arousing a desire for revelry after winter’s confinement. It’s part of a series of calendar paintings celebrating the months of the year and appropriate seasonal activities. Though, in this...
Feast In The Park Of The Duke Of Mantua or Fête dans le Jardin du Duc de Mantoue is picnicky but not a feast. The curators of the Musée des Beaux-Arts probably assign the title. It is a garden of lovers dining alfresco in an imaginary architectural setting. The...
Trevelyon’s Miscellany is a meticulously illustrated compendium of 1608. It’s stocked with a calendar, scenes from the Bible, current events, court, political figures, costumes, fabric designs, games, dances, etc. It’s among the marvels of bookcraft...
Cervantes’s merienda looks like a picnic on the grass. It occurs while, Don Quixote and Sancho engage in a spirited discussion of the uses of enchantment and the power of imagination with the Canon, the curate, and the barber. They sit on the grass waiting for...
Van de Velde’s reputation is now based on his naturalistic landscape. But he was in demand among the affluent Amsterdam community, for whom he painted many scenes of their parties, especially garden parties, of which An Elegant Company in a Garden is an exemplar. The...
Though it is unmistakably a merienda at the beach, the title given for this painting in the Pitti Palace is Landscape with Bathers. The seashore is a tumultuous blend of barren, jutting rocks. But Carracci, the focus of which is a serene woman dressed in red sitting...
Early in the 16th century, Dutch emblem books primers or handbooks for youthful aristocrats. Among the more socially and sexually suggestive of these books are The Garden of Love [Hortus Voluptatum] (1599) and New Mirror for Youth [Nieuwen ieucht spieghel] (1617),...
Napoletano’s Merenda sull’erba is a landscape with Florentines enjoying an informal outdoor lunch by a lake. Merenda is Italian for picnic, which was not coined until 1649 in Paris. The picnickers have spread their cloth in the shade. To the left, a cook works at a...
Hals’s De_buitenpartij (627) is of family and friends dining outside in the garden of their estate. It was meant to show off. Featured Image: Dirck Hals. Debuiten partij or The Fête Champetre (1627). There are two other versions of this group. Rijksmuseum, Amsterdam...
Passeri’s A Party Feasting in a Garden seems like a happy end to an alfresco luncheon. Young couples are deep in conversation, flirting, and courting, which suggests this is a garden of love. It is casual and innocent, though Passari is a moralist. Close examination...
