LISSE, Dirck van der

In the 1620s and 1630s, Dutch aristocrats furthered a new vogue for particular kinds of history and portrait painting, of ‘pastoral’ scenes involving the loves of shepherds and shepherdesses in lush, idealized landscapes. In 1635, four painters made a series of pastoral paintings for the Stadhouder’s court, chronicling the popular story of Amarillis and Mirtillo. In a scene contributed by van der Lisse (one of the numerous followers of Cornelis Poelenburgh), maidens play blind man’s buff with the blindfolded shepherd Mirtillo.

Ovid describes at length (Met. 3:138-253) how the young prince Actaeon, hunting in the forest, stumbled accidentally upon the grotto where Diana and her companion were bathing. To punish him for the glimpse of divine nudity, the goddess turned him into a stag.

The story with Diana and Actaeon was a favourite with the late Mannerist painters. This is understandable, because the myth, particularly in Ovid’s playful, witty and lively presentation, contains both stimulatingly erotic and shivering horror story elements and thus was perfectly suited for the contemporary spirit.

Dirck van der Lisse as one among the numerous pupils of Poelenburgh whose works can be closest to the master’s.