Landscape with Shepherds and Flock of Sheep

This pastoral landscape with shepherds at the National Museum of Western Art in Tokyo shows Fragonard working in the Arcadian landscape tradition. The idealized rural scenes of shepherds and flocks drew on a literary and artistic tradition stretching from Virgil through Claude Lorrain to Boucher. The bravura brushwork—rapid, swirling strokes building luminous effects—was applied alla prima onto canvas primed with warm ochre grounds, a technique Fragonard developed after studying Tiepolo in...

The warm, golden landscape light unifies the pastoral scene, with the shepherd figures providing human scale amid the expansive terrain. The atmospheric handling of distance creates a convincing sense of depth.