Boar Hunt

From the 1630s the settings of Snyders’s hunting and animal fighting paintings become more Baroque. The Boar Hunt, which is more than five metres wide, is one of the most characteristic examples of Snyders’s late style. The colourful and varied appearance of such paintings demonstrate his increasing reaction to the growing requirement for decorative settings, which was also apparent in other fields of painting.

During the seventeenth century, dramatic hunt scenes often decorated royal hunting lodges. While Snyders’s contemporaries normally put man at the centre of such images, Snyders concentrated on realistic observation of the animals. His highly sought-after paintings were often based on portraits of individual hunting dogs. Here, the dog on the far right may be wearing a protective cloak because he was particularly prized by his owner.

The painting is signed lower right, on dog’s collar: F. Snyders fecit.