The Herdsman's Cottage, or Sunset
1880
Medium
Etching; second state of two
Dimensions
plate: 4 7/8 x 4 5/8 in. (12.4 x 11.7 cm) image: 3 7/8 x 3 in. (9.8 x 7.6 cm) sheet: 6 5/16 x 5 1/2 in. (16.1 x 13.9 cm)
Classification
Prints
Department
Drawings and Prints
Museum
Metropolitan Museum of Art, New York, NY
Credit
Bequest of Phyllis Massar, 2011
Accession Number
2012.136.594
Tags
Art Historical Context
Samuel Palmer’s *The Herdsman’s Cottage, or Sunset* captures a tranquil moment of rural life as evening light filters through dense woodland. Created in 1880, this small etching depicts a modest cottage nestled among towering trees, evoking the quiet harmony between humans and nature. Palmer, a leading figure of the Romantic movement and a member of the visionary “Ancients” group influenced by William Blake, devoted much of his career to celebrating the pastoral English landscape with luminous, almost spiritual intensity. The medium of etching was central to Palmer’s late work, allowing him t...
About the Artist
Samuel Palmer
Samuel Palmer was born on 27 January 1805 in Newington, London, the son of a bookseller and sometime Baptist minister. He had little formal schooling and almost no conventional artistic training, yet he possessed an instinctive gift for drawing that led him to exhibit Turner-inspired works at the Royal Academy when he was only fourteen years old. In 1824 his mentor, the painter John Linnell, intro...