One man is wearing blue pants, a white long-sleeved shirt, a brown skull cap and is smoking a pipe. It seems as if he is staring into the picture while kneeling down next to a green knapsack. A young girl is stretching with her hands clutched together to the left of him. She is dressed in a blue skirt below her knees, a gray top with a black belt, white jacket and has a white purse over her shoulder. She has a round, expressionless face with rosy cheeks and short, curly blonde hair. She is stretching toward the sky in an absolute state of relaxation. Another older woman is asleep on the ground to the left of the young girl stretching. She has long brown hair and her cheeks are pink. The wrinkles on her face show that she has been through difficult times in her life, and the mountain is a place to escape it all. She is wearing a brown skirt, a red jacket, and an orange shirt underneath while lying on top of a purple blanket and clutching a walking cane. There is man in the distance behind the three in the front. He is wearing long, tan pants, a short-sleeved orange shirt with a long-sleeved white shirt underneath. He is holding a cane with two hands behind his back almost like a dancer’s pose. Behind him there is a couple, a man and a woman, near the edge of a cliff. They are both looking down amazed at the chasm beneath them. A figure is standing in the background on the painting. It is either a man or a woman standing alone on a grassy knoll.
While the connection between the figures is ambiguous, there is a direct connection between the shape and posture of each person and the surrounding mountain formations. With the man kneeling down and the young girl stretching, there is a mountain in the backdrop that is above the rest. It starts down low and increases in elevation at steady incline like the postures of the man and girl. The crescent seems to be piercing the smooth, blue sky. And with the woman the lying down, she relates with the plateau; they are both flat while the other people and mountains are vertical. The man with the cane behind his back is next to a narrow formation of rock. It is in an upright position just how the man is standing. The man and the woman on the edge of the cliff are higher up than the man with the cane behind his back, and therefore the rock formation that is closest to them is taller than the one next to the man. The figure all the way in the back is standing on a grassy hill far away from the other people. And he almost seems to blend into the background.
On the mountain, these people have a peace or transcendence with nature. Balthus’ painting demonstrates how people and nature are connected and coexist with each other. It is imperative that there is a relationship and unity between nature and humanity in order for there to be existence on this world.
