A Shepherdess

ca.1900 · Painting · 31.2 × 26.2 cm

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Not on view at present

Where is “A Shepherdess” now? Collection: Victoria and Albert Museum, London. Not on view at present. Checked September 25, 2026.

Victoria and Albert Museum

London, United Kingdom

It belongs to the collection, but is not on display at present.

Checked: 16 days ago
In this state since: Sep 25, 2026
Source: The museum

On the map Museum page

About the painting

According to a letter written in 1944 by Miss P. Pirie, the artist's sister, who donated these paintings to the V&A, Helen Pirie 'studied mostly in Paris at the Académie Delécluse in the rue Notre Dame des Champs and also at Julien's [School of Art], and for a short time in Rome'. The pictures comprise twenty-two watercolour paintings and nine black and white drawings, all of them illustrations to the Pirie sisters' book 'Kashmir: The Land of Streams and Solitudes' (London: The Bodley Head, 1908). In her letter to the V&A the donor went on to describe their travels together:

Read on

'We spent the greater part of three years in Kashmir, going up in March & staying till November or late October each year. We went up the Gilgit Road by special permission as, in those days anyhow, ordinary travellers were not allowed on that frontier road. We did not go by the usual route, but a wilder way over a higher pass than the Burzil. We went to the foot of the first glacier of Nanga Parbat, & camped there at Taroking for several days. Other parts we went to were Kishtwar, the Margan Pass, & Chamba. We usually marched in & out of Kashmir by the Pír Panjal route as we found it more interesting than the usual route by tonga [carriage] - now by motor - up the Jhelum Valley. As we were alone we could please ourselves, & as we could speak Hindustani & soon picked up a little Kashmiri, we had no trouble.'

This picture is a portrait of a Kashmiri shepherdess with a short stick in her right hand. She has her hair in long braids and wears a blue head-dress edged with red, a shalwar kamiz and a silver neck ornament; her feet are bare.

Victoria and Albert Museum