A Spaniel with Dead Game in a Landscape
Alexandre-François Desportes (Champigneulles 1661 - Paris 1743)
Category
Art / Oil paintings
Date
circa 1720 (signed)
Materials
Oil on canvas
Measurements
1111 x 889 mm (43 ¾ x 35 in)
Order this imageCollection
Attingham Park, Shropshire
NT 609005
Caption
Hunting pieces not only allowed artists to demonstrate their skill, but also appealed to the tastes of wealthy landowners, for whom hunting was a noble pursuit. Desportes was accepted into the French Royal Academy of Painting and Sculpture in 1699, having submitted a self-portrait as a hunter surrounded by dead game (now in the Louvre, France). He went on to become chief painter of hunts and animals to Louis XIV, the Regent, and Louis XV, until supplanted by Jean-Baptiste Oudry (1686-1755).
Summary
Oil painting on canvas, A Spaniel with Dead Game by Alexandre-François Desportes (Champigneulles 1661 – Paris 1743), signed, bottom left on stone: f. Desportes, circa 1720. The spaniel lies to the right beside a tree from which is hung a cock pheasant, a dead mallard, woodpecker and two French partridges on the ground. Inscribed in large black paint, in bottom hollow: ILo [?] 5.
Provenance
Attingham collection. 1847 Catalogue of Paintings p.4; 1861 Inventory p.209; 1913 Inventory p.64; Bequeathed to the National Trust with the estate, house and contents of Attingham by Thomas Henry Noel-Hill, 8th Baron Berwick (1877-1947) on 15th May 1953.
Credit line
Attingham Park, The Berwick Collection (National Trust)
Marks and inscriptions
On frame: No. 051 (Printed number on frame) On stretcher (middle horizontal): Royal Academy of Arts, London, W1 / France in the 18th century, 1968/Artist. Desportes/Title ... Still Life / Owner .. National Trust - Attingham /Serial No... 4. On stretcher (middle vertical): W. Freeman & Son Ltd., Picture Restorers ... No. (in ink) 513 On stretcher (bottom): ATT/P/069 On reverse of frame (top): indecipherable chalk marks, except for Cat. 193 & 193. On reverse of frame (bottom): ATT/P/069
Makers and roles
Alexandre-François Desportes (Champigneulles 1661 - Paris 1743), artist