Herd of Goats at the Foot of a Waterfall

In 1657 Gaspard Dughet was elected to the Accademia di San Luca, the academy of Rome's painters. By then he had worked for patrons as grand as Pope Innocent X, and later the Colonna family would have him fresco a room in their palace. Few of his canvases are dated or documented, so his chronology rests largely on style, and the gallery places this one around 1660 or 1661, a few years after he joined the academy. The title names its subject plainly, a flock of goats at the foot of a waterfall. The canvas measures 130 by 90 centimetres, close to the size of the Waterfall in the Roman Campagna, the other Dughet in the same room.