Boar Hunt in Tivoli (Italian Park)
Artist/Maker
Material / Technique
Dimensionsh x w: Mått 167 x 251 cm
Inventory numberNMDrh 332
Other titlesTitle (sv): Hundar anfalla ett vildsvin Title (en): Boar Hunt in Tivoli (Italian Park)
DescriptionCatalogue raisonné: Description in Flemish paintings C. 1600-C. 1800 III, Nationalmuseum, Stockholm, 2010, cat.no. 24: Technical notes: The support consists of two pieces of textile joined vertically in the centre of the painting. Fragments of the tacking edges have been preserved on the left and right sides and at the lower edge where the motif has been folded over the edge of the stretcher. The selvage of the right hand tacking edge has also been preserved. There is distinct cusping along the left and right edges. The canvas has been lined and mounted on a nonoriginal stretcher. The preparation of the support consists of a light ground that is covered by a light brownish-yellow thin and semi-transparent imprimatura. Both pieces of the canvas have probably been prepared in the same way. The ground covers the texture of the fabric completely. The paint layers are applied thinly and opaquely. The lower part of the painting has a darker, thinly applied paint layer in which craquelure can be seen. The figures are rendered vividly and with paint applied opaquely with a dry brush in the depiction of the coats of the animals. Reserves have been left for the animals in the foreground and background. The tree on the right and the vegetation on the left have been reserved. The sky has been painted after the figures and foreground and middle ground. Some small adjustments of the outlines of the figures have been made. The palette consists mainly of earth colours and red, white and black. There is considerable similarity of the painting techniques in nos. 23 and 25 in the brushwork used to render the coats of the animals and the reserves of the figures. The same colour changes can be found in the rendering of the foliage of the trees, where the green paint layer has become brownish and where highlights in mixtures of white and yellow can clearly be seen in both paintings. The painting underwent conservation treatment in 1926 and 2003. Provenance: Drottningholm 1845, no. 268 (as David Klöcker Ehrenstrahl). See further under no. 21 (Drh 329). Bibliography: Cederlöf 1977, pp. 255–256, fig. 7; Robels 1989, cat. no. A 228 (as circle of Frans Snyders). Seven hunting dogs chase a wild boar. The scene is set in the foreground of a wooded landscape similar to that of the previous and following two numbers, with some gnarled oak trees on the right and opening up towards a distant valley on the left. As the huge boar leaps to the left, several hounds lunge to bite the creature or race in hot pursuit, while others are shown tumbling perilously underfoot, or sent flying through the air, legs flailing. Attributed by Robels (1989) to an unidentified artist in the circle of Frans Snyders, the overall composition of the present painting, a few of the hunting dogs and details of the landscape setting, are clearly derived from a frequently copied Boar Hunt in a private collection in Barcelona (see above under no. 20), or the signed painting by Snyders of the same subject in Boston (Museum of Fine Arts). The former was ascribed to Snyders (and Paul de Vos?) by Robels (1989), and dated by her to the 1620s, but a close variant of the composition is also associated with Pieter Boel, Snyders’ follower and reputed pupil.1 Although now shown in a slightly different grouping, the poses and attitudes of some of the principal hounds in the Drottningholm picture, such as the dog cast on its back with legs flailing in the air, or the elongated white hound with black spots, were taken over quite literally from animals in the Barcelona or Boston pictures. Others, such as the dog with open jaws lying in the foreground or one of those on the right, rushing forward in pursuit of its prey, its body cut off by the edge of the picture, seem more closely related to the animals depicted in a signed Boar Hunt by a pupil of Boel’s, David de Coninck, in Prague (Národní Galerie) .2 The massive leaping boar thrusting its powerful head back to the right, in the direction of its attackers, occurs in several works by Snyders.3 CF 1 See Robels 1989, cat. no. 225, illus. Engravings after the Barcelona painting were executed by François Joullain and Pieter Boel (Hollstein III, p. 58, no. 7), and an etching by Lucas Vorsterman after Boel, showing that Boel had employed Snyders’ composition, see a variant in Lord Hesketh’s coll., possibly to be attributed to Boel, see Robels, no. 225d. 2 Oil on canvas, 166 x 239 cm, signed “D. Koninck”, Prague, Národní Galerie, inv. no. DO 5016, see photo on file at the RKD, The Hague. And cf. the same dog, shown in reverse, in a Bear Hunt at Dyrham, Gloucestershire, Dyrham Park (National Trust), there attributed to Frans Snyders, see Robels 1989, cat. no. A244. 3 See, for example, Robels 1989, cat.nos. 223 I, 223 II, 230, illus.[End] Beskrivning på inventarieblankett: Ett vildsvin på språng vänder huvudet bakåt med öppet gap mot tre förföljande hundar. En annan hund ligger under vildsvinet och en har fått tag i djurets rygg. Framför vildsvinet ramlar en rödbrun hund med benen i vädret ner i en å i förgrunden till vänster, samtidigt som en annan hund tar sig upp ur vattnet. I bakgrunden till höger en tjock ek, till vänster öppet landskap med trädpartier och blånande höjder. Molnig himmel med fåglar. Litteratur: Sixten Strömbom, Konsthistorisk tidskrift IX 1940, sid. 36. B. Rapp ”Djur och stilleben i karolinskt måleri” 1951, s. 36. A. Hahr: Till konterfejaren Christian von Thums biografi, Konsthist. tidskrift IX, s. 55 f. Anmärkning: Tillhör serie omfattande NMDrh 329, 331, 332, 334, 336. 1669 inköpte änkedrottning Hedvig Eleonora 8 stycken stora jaktstycken av konterfejaren Christian von Thum, vilka hon förärade konung Karl XI som nyårsgåva. Sixten Strömbom har i Konsthistorisk tidskrift IX 1940 om Christian von Thum d.ä., sid. 36, framfört tanken, att de kopior efter Snyderska jakter, som nu finnas på Drottningholm, hör till denna serie. Han ansog det emellertid osäkert, om bilderna utförts av Thum. B. Rapp har (i ”Djur och stilleben i karolinskt måleri” 1951, s. 36) framhållit det som osannolikt att Thum själv skulle utfört dessa jaktbilder, vilka även han anser möjligen kunna identifieras med de på Drottningholm i Snyders och Paul de Vos’stil. Jfr även A. Hahr: Till konterfejaren Christian von Thums biografi (i Konsthist. tidskrift IX, s. 55 f). En vildsvinsjakt av F. Snyders, såld hos Bukowski i dec 1918 (katalog, pl.) har vissa detaljer överensstämmande såväl med denna vildsvinsjakt som med rävjakten, NMDrh 329. Se NMDrh 329. 1845 års inv nr 268. Konserverad 1926 av G. Jaensson. Svart ram med förgyllda barocklister Foto/Neg.nr: C 2185 [slut]
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