A Grecian Harvest Home [3 of 17 Prints]

Artist James Barry (1741 - 1806)

Date1791

MediumEngraving on paper

DimensionsImage Size: 41.6 x 50.3 cm

ClassificationsPrint

Credit LineCollection & image © Hugh Lane Gallery. Donated by Eugene L. Clarke, 1963.

Object number1185.03

DescriptionThird print of seventeen in 'A series of etchings by James Barry Esq. From his Original and Justly Celebrated Paintings in the Great Room of the Society of Arts, Manufactures and Commerce.'

Although the prints have been bound with the title 'A Series of Etchings ...' They are in fact engravings (intaglio prints).

A detailed and in-depth description is transcribed below. This description is taken from the bound version of Barry's etchings and printed on the page opposite the actual print.

'A Grecian Harvest-Home.

The season is, as the title expresses, that of harvest; and as most of the persons represented are employed in rural sports, the evening is chosen, as the most proper time for such relaxation from the labours of the field. In the foreground is a double terminal figure of Sylvanus and Pan, with their proper attributes; round which, young men and women, in beautiful forms, and lightly habited, are dancing to the music of a rural pipe and tabor, and seem, in the language of the poet, to

"_______ trip it as they go
"On the light fantastic toe."

Behind them, are oxen with a load of corn, and other characteristic marks of the season of the year.
On one side of this happy group, appears the father, with a fillet round his head, and in his hand a staff, his aged wife entering to behold and partake of the festivity of the scene.
In the opposite corner of the Picture are some rustics sitting, in drunken disorder, with the fruits of the earth and implements of husbandry near them.
The distant parts of this pleasing Picture exhibit a view of a fertile cultivated country, with a farm-house, near which are men wrestling, and engaged in the other manly exercises which strengthen the body and elevate the mind to heroic actions; aged men are sitting and lying along, discoursing and enjoying a view of those athletic sports, in which they can no longer engage. Here also are seen the various employments of a country life, as binding corn, tending bees, courtship, and every where a number of children. A marriage procession is advancing from a distant temple; and the joy of the accompanying figures expresses the happiness arising on such occasions, the labourers even suspending their work to hail the happy pair; in short, whatever can best point out a state of happiness, simplicity, and fecundity, in which, though not attended with much éclat, the duty we owe to God, our neighbour, and ourselves, is perhaps much better attended to than in any other state of life.
Still further to embellish this Picture, the Artist has introduced, sitting on a pent-house, a peacock in fine plumage; and at the top of the Picture, Ceres, Bacchus, Pan, &c. are looking down on the innocent festivity of their happy votaries: behind them is a limb of the zodiac, with the signs Leo, Virgo, and Libra, which mark the season of the year.'

Below the image is an inscription. For the full inscription, see the Inscription field.

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