14. Albert Meyeringh
(1645-1714)
Landscape with Mercury and the Daughters of Cecrops

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Meyeringh, Landscape with Mercury

Landscape with Mercury and the Daughters of Cecrops

etching, 1695, Bartsch 25, Hollstein 25 only state, 292 x 393 mm. Very fine impression on laid paper with small margins; traces of a vertical center fold and three pinholes. Meyeringh was of a slightly later generation of Italianate Dutchmen, but actually spent about fifteen years in Italy rather than just recollecting, back in the Netherlands, the sights of a short trip. He was, of course, strongly influenced by Gaspard Dughet and through him, Poussin. In mythology, Mercury (or, more accurately here, Hermes) was said to have fallen in love with one of the daughters of Cecrops, who was the legendary founder of Athens. But the image is not about mythology; it is about the Italian landscape, what has become, even well before this, the "classical landscape." It is a beautiful place of mountains, rivers and trees with aesthetically-placed classical fountains, temples and ruins, and sometimes populated by mythological figures. The latter remind us of a story, but also serve as compositional elements. The odd thing is that, barring the gods and heroes, some places in Italy really look like that.