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Willem van Aelst (artist) Dutch, 1626 - 1683 Still Life with Dead Game, 1661 oil on canvas overall: 84.7 x 67.3 cm (33 3/8 x 26 1/2 in.) Pepita Milmore Memorial Fund 1982.36.1 On View |
Still lifes with hunting motifs became popular in Dutch art in the latter part of the seventeenth century, at a time when Dutch society grew wealthier and more refined. One of the most important artists in this tradition was Willem van Aelst, who came from Delft but trained and worked for a number of years in France and Italy.
Van Aelst depicted a number of dead animals hanging above and resting upon a stone ledge on which a blue and gold hunter's game pouch lies. The animals were painted very precisely, and most of them can be identified. Aside from the large European hare and roosters are a partridge, kingfisher, and common wheatear. Also visible are two falconer's hoods, perhaps to indicate the nature of the hunt.
That Van Aelst's painting was intended to represent the general theme of the hunt rather than the spoils of a specific hunt is evident from the relief depicting Diana and Actaeon on the front of the stone ledge. This popular story from Ovid's Metamorphoses describes how Actaeon, a mortal hunter, accidentally disturbs Diana, the goddess of the hunt, at her bath; Diana transforms him into a stag as punishment.