狩りをするディアナ - 眠るディアナとニンフたちを覗くサテュロス

This small panel was made by two hands, both of them famous. The nude figures, Diana the huntress and her nymphs asleep in a clearing while satyrs creep up to look at them, were painted by Rubens. The wood, the leaves, the dogs and the game are by his friend Jan Brueghel, known as Velvet Brueghel for the softness of his detail. The two men were close in Antwerp and often worked a single picture together, each doing what he did best. It belongs to a small group of Diana scenes they produced around 1623. The satyrs at the edge carry the old warning of the myth, that to spy on the goddess at her rest was to invite disaster. Look at how the smooth painting of skin gives way, at the tree line, to another artist's touch entirely.