This canvas presents one of the most persistent subjects in Pedro Orrente´s substantial output: the Nativity and the Adoration of the shepherds, a popular theme among seventeenth-century Spanish painters. Bucolic scenes were also captured successfully throughout the sixteenth century and much of the seventeenth century by the influential family of Italian painters: Jacopo, Leandro and Francesco Bassano. These artists from Venice specialised in pastoral scenes, some of which were based on biblical passages. Orrente spent some time in Venice with Leandro Bassano (1557-1622), adopting some of the Bassano family´s approach. His art became, in the eyes of many of his contemporaries, a Spanish extension of the pictorial worlds created by the Bassanos, as evinced by The Adoration of the shepherds, which faithfully reflects several Bassano compositions. The figures are situated in the foreground and the principal subject matter is placed on the viewer´s right-hand side of the painting. Secondary characters appear as a compositional counterpoint on the other side, surrounded by an open space that reveals a dusky landscape in the distance. The figures are taken directly from paintings by the Bassanos: the shepherd with a lamb on his shoulders; the woman whose back is turned to the viewer, showing the naked soles of her feet; the man wearing a conical hat with red plumes; the animals intermingled with the human figures; and the Virgin holding a white cloth, either revealing the Christ Child or about to cover Him. Orrente would often return to these pictorial models, adapting them to diverse formats that on occasion would allow him to include a host of angels. In the present case, he executed the painting on a horizontal canvas, which would have made the inclusion of such celestial apparitions difficult. In addition, the displacement of the principal subject from the centre to one side of the painting diminishes the overtly sacred tone of the subject, making it almost a congenial genre scene in which the divine is represented with a charmingly quotidian accent. With works such as this, Orrente brought together fundamental aspects of artistic taste from the period. He was able to prolong his success in the wake of the Bassanos by adapting their art to a Spanish society that maintained an interest in religious painting, but that was likewise attracted to new pictorial genres, such as landscape and still life. Elements of the latter are always present in the foreground of Orrente´s paintings. He also added novel aspects of the naturalistic style that had developed in Spain in the first third of the seventeenth century and that was itself indebted to the work of Caravaggio (1571-1610:) the sharp contrast in light and shadow; the tight modelling of the figures; and the use of a palette that abounded in earthy tones, applied over a layer of reddish chestnut-coloured paint. The wide dissemination of works by Orrente is not surprising, for he understood, through his contact with the Bassanos, the importance of running a prolific workshop, perhaps several in Orrente´s case. This helped him keep pace with the numerous commissions he received from different places, including Toledo, Murcia and Valencia. He also had several followers who contributed to the continued success of his painting, which helps to explain the uneven quality of the works associated with Orrente. The present painting from the Prado is considered to be of the highest quality and entirely from the hand of the artist. There are no known copies. The painting was originally in the Royal Collections and it is possible that it was first intended to hang in the Buen Retiro Palace, Madrid. Contemporary records indicate that works by Orrente, as well as works by the Bassanos, were part of the Palace´s decorations, but there is no indication of their exact placement. In 1772, and again in 1794, the painting was recorded as having been hung in the Royal Palace in Madrid, together with some Venetian works and very near two works by Bassano and two flower vases by Juan Fernández, El Labrador (Ruiz, L.: Portrait of Spain. Masterpieces from the Prado, Queensland Art Gallery-Art Exhibitions Australia, 2012, p. 148).