Diana and Endymion

Jean Honoré Fragonard

National Gallery of Art

Close to us, a woman and a winged, child-like putto float on clouds above a clean-shaven young man in a forest setting in this horizontal painting. All three people have smooth, pale skin, rosy cheeks, and ash-blond hair. The man reclines with his torso propped so his feet extend along the rocky ground to our left. He rests his head in his right hand, farther from us, with that elbow resting on a rock. We look up onto the underside of his chin and delicate features. A scarlet-red robe falls from his shoulders and across his hips. One knee is propped up, and that foot is tucked behind his other ankle. His muscular torso, arms, and legs are bare. His left hand, closer to us, rests by his side and loosely holds a staff. Three tan-colored sheep with long faces lie or stand behind the man, in the lower right corner of the painting. A light gray hound dog with floppy ears sleeps with its drooping muzzle resting on its paws in the shadows at the man’s feet. The woman floats just above the man, reclining on a fog-gray cloud with her feet angled toward the man’s torso. Her curls are held back by a topaz-blue ribbon, and she looks down at the man, a faint smile on her lips. A loose white garment partially covered by a blue robe falls from her shoulders, leaving one breast and one leg bare. She reaches outward with her left hand, palm out, and the other hand rests down on the cloud alongside her. A sharply pointed, luminous crescent moon curves up to each side behind the cloud. The chubby, nude, baby-like putto nestles on his belly in a cloud between the man and woman. He has short, tousled hair, stubby wings, and his skin is flushed pink. An arrow held in one hand points toward the man, and the putto rests his other hand in a bunch of pink roses. Plants and flowers grow in patches on the ground around the man. The sky above is framed with steel-gray clouds against pale blue.