18C Obedient, Peaceful Women Tending Sheep

1750 Philippe Mercier (Philip Mercier) (French artist, 1689-1760)  Anne Fairfax as a Shepherdess

During the 17C & 18C artists painted their contemporaries as personifications & allegories, & often painters would put the faces of their patrons on the bodies of the saints.  These came to be called donor portraits. These paintings remained popular, as they expanded to show the wealthy sitter as a Greek goddess, or muse, or nymph in in a rustic setting. They grew to include portraits of a shepherdess in pastoral scenes wearing idealized attire, nothing like the clothing worn by real women tending sheep.

Early 17C portraits of women portrayed as shepherdesses were more seductive than those painted later.  In the 18C, the wealthy, identified sitters would be painted in more traditional, conservative posed & costumes.  The shepherdess theme remained popular & expanded throughout the 18C.

1769 Joseph Wright Of Derby (British artist, 1734-1797)  Anna Ashton, later Mrs Thomas Case

1765 John Theodore Heins Jr.(British artist,1732-1771) Phoebe Fonnereau, as a Shepherdess

1764  Joshua Reynolds (English artist, 1723-1792) Anne Dashwood, Countess Galloway as a Shepherdess

1760s Francis Cotes, (English painter, 1726-1770) Elizabeth Cust, Mrs Yorke as a Shepherdess

1760 Studio of Boucher Madame Boucher as a Shepherdess

1760 George Chalmers, (Scottish artist, 1720-1791) A Shepherdess in a Landscape

1760 Carle Vanloo (French painter, 1705-1765) A Lady and Gentleman as elegant Shepherd and Shepherdess

1755 Maurice Quentin de La Tour (French artist, 1704-1788)  Madame de Pompadour as a Shepherdess

1740-50 Unknown British artist Portrait of a Lady as a Shepherdess

1725 Unknown artist often attr. to Charles Jervas or Charles Jarvis (Irish artist, c 1675-1739)  Mary Elizabeth Davenport, Mrs John Mytton, as a Girl, in Shepherdess Costume

1725 Enoch Seeman the Younger (Polish-born artist, 1694–1745) Lady Rachel Cavendish (1697–1780), Lady Morgan, as a Shepherdess

1725 Charles Jervas or Charles Jarvis (Irish artist, c 1675-1739) Lady Rachel Cavendish (1697–1780), Lady Morgan, as a Shepherdess

 1700s James Francis Maubert (Irish artist, 1666-1746) Portrait of Henrietta Duchess of Bolton

Godfrey Kneller (German-born English artist, 1646-1723) The Honourable Janet Ogilvie (1668–1743)

Godfrey Kneller (born Gottfried Kniller) (German-born English artist, 1646-1723)  Frances Whitmore

1710 Godfrey Kneller (German-born English artist, 1646-1723) Lady Mary Pierrepont, Later Wortley Montagu

1713 Godrey Kneller (German-born English painter, 1646–1723) Lady Jane Jackson (d 1731)

1790s Thomas Barker of Bath (British artist, 1769-1847) (style of) A Shepherdess and Sheep