Monday, February 26, 2018

Hondecoeter's Birds


Melchior d'Hondecoeter (1636-1695) was a Dutch animal painter who specialized in birds.


Many of his contemporary animal painters focused on painting dead animals in still-life positions, but Hondecoeter preferred to show them in living poses.


It was said of Hondecoeter that he "displays the maternity of the hen with as much tenderness and feeling as Raphael the maternity of Madonnas."
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Melchior d'Hondecoeter on Wikipedia

2 comments:

Steve said...

Interesting how contemporary the first image of sketches seems. Those could be the young ones from my neighbor’s coop across the road. Love the wee head poking through the plumage in the third image, and yes, the hen’s expression is oddly beatific.

Carlos said...

Hi James. Are these paintings and studies done in oils? They certainly look like they are.

On a separate note, I've tried both gouache and watercolor after learning from your videos and your blog and I'm really enjoying it. I'd like to try oils at some point but I have no idea what brands and colors should I get. Could you give me some advice on it or have you written any posts on that subject?

Best,
Carlos