DESPORTES, Alexandre-François

The painting is signed and dated on the table upper right: Desportes./ 1710.

The triple portrait of the canines, Bonne, Nonne and Ponne was a 1702 royal commission from King Louis XIV for his suite’s antechamber at his Marly residence. Louis XIV adored his dogs and never neglected their care. Sometimes he left his council to visit them and he often fed them dinner personally.

The present preparatory sketch was for the painting that is now in the collections of the Mus�e de la Chasse et de la Nature in Paris.

This painting and its companion piece Pantry with Artichokes, Cauliflowers and a Basket of Mushrooms were probably overdoor paintings.

Besides animal painting, Desportes was widely recognized for his still-lifes. In the present painting, the still-life elements such as the basket of plums and strawberries refer to a very classical culture of this genre, and thoroughly reveal his full-depth knowledge of works by Louise Moillon, Fran�ois Garnier and Pierre Dupuis.

The painting is signed and dated lower right: Desportes 1720.

In the last decades of the seventeenth century the ideal landscape of Claude Lorrain was continued by painters such as �tienne Allegrain and Pierre-Antoine Patel (Patel the Younger) who added to it a new type of artificiality which was almost eighteenth-century in character. But one artist, Alexandre-Fran�ois Desportes, breaks entirely new ground. He spent the years 1695-96 at the Court of Poland as a portrait painter. On his return to Paris he began to devote his attention to the painting of animals, in the form either of hunting-scenes or of still-life compositions with dead game. It was for these works that he was celebrated in his own day.

But as a preparation for the landscape backgrounds of his hunting scenes Desportes made a series of studies in oil on paper, which reveal an entirely novel approach to nature. They are direct notes of views which he saw in the neighbourhood of Paris and in the Seine valley, put down with sensitiveness and humility, with no desire to improve the actual scene so as to make it fit in with a preconceived idea either of what nature should be or of how a composition should be constructed. In some cases the designs are simple, in others they have unexpected features, such as the intrusion of a reed or a tree-trunk into the very foreground. In colour they are subdued, painted in the quiet light of the Île-de-France, which no one else rendered so faithfully till the time of Corot.

Desportes lived till 1743, and many of his works belong to the eighteenth century in character, but these sketches seem to date from the years 1690 to 1706. In spirit they look forward beyond the eighteenth century to the methods of the Barbizon school.

This painting and its companion piece Dog Guarding a Hunting Trophy were probably overdoor paintings.

In the last decades of the seventeenth century the ideal landscape of Claude Lorrain was continued by painters such as �tienne Allegrain and Pierre-Antoine Patel (Patel the Younger) who added to it a new type of artificiality which was almost eighteenth-century in character. But one artist, Alexandre-Fran�ois Desportes, breaks entirely new ground. He spent the years 1695-96 at the Court of Poland as a portrait painter. On his return to Paris he began to devote his attention to the painting of animals, in the form either of hunting-scenes or of still-life compositions with dead game. It was for these works that he was celebrated in his own day.

But as a preparation for the landscape backgrounds of his hunting scenes Desportes made a series of studies in oil on paper, which reveal an entirely novel approach to nature. They are direct notes of views which he saw in the neighbourhood of Paris and in the Seine valley, put down with sensitiveness and humility, with no desire to improve the actual scene so as to make it fit in with a preconceived idea either of what nature should be or of how a composition should be constructed. In some cases the designs are simple, in others they have unexpected features, such as the intrusion of a reed or a tree-trunk into the very foreground. In colour they are subdued, painted in the quiet light of the Île-de-France, which no one else rendered so faithfully till the time of Corot.

Desportes lived till 1743, and many of his works belong to the eighteenth century in character, but these sketches seem to date from the years 1690 to 1706. In spirit they look forward beyond the eighteenth century to the methods of the Barbizon school.

Desportes was the son of a peasant and was born in Champagne. At the age of twelve he was sent by his father to Paris and entered the studio of Nicasius Bernaerts (1620—78), a Fleming and a pupil of Synders who enjoyed considerable success as a painter of animals. After the death of his master Desportes studied at the Academy and for a time seemed to be settling down to a career as a portrait painter, in which capacity he spent the years 1695—96 at the Court of Poland. On his return to Paris he began to devote his attention to the painting of animals, in the form either of hunting-scenes or of still-life compositions with dead game. It was for these works that he was celebrated in his own day, and they were bought by all the most important patrons of the day, headed by Louis XIV, who commissioned hunting-scenes, portraits of his favourite dogs, and pictures of rare animals for Marly and the M�nagerie at Versailles.

The painting depicts a still-life with a monkey and a basket of fruit all resting on a ledge with a landscape beyond. It is signed and dated on the ledge: Desportes 1725.

The painting shows a still-life of game with a bowl of plums and peaches. It is an example of the paintings of trophies of the hunt and dead game arranged with fruit and flowers and vegetables on tables or in landscape settings, which Desportes began to execute after 1700. These works combine Flemish realism and brilliant colours and French classical principles.

This painting depicts a still-life of a kitchen table with dressed partridge, sheared pheasants, a rack and leg of lamb, a basket of oranges and five ripe pears.

Alexandre-Fran�ois Desportes can be grouped with Jean-Sim�on Chardin and Jean-Baptiste Oudry as one of the most important still-life painters in France during the 18th century. While Chardin remained loyal to compositions made up of simple household objects, Desportes and Ourdry turned towards hunting scenes, game pieces and portraits of animals.