Dead Jay (Garrulus glandarius)

Attributed to: Jacopo de' Barbari (in circa 1505-1515)

Thank you. Your question has been submitted.

Unfortunately something has gone wrong while sending your question. Please try again.

Request high-res image

Specifications

Title	Dead Jay (Garrulus glandarius)
Material and technique	Brush and black, brown and grey ink, white priming in the foreground, on parchment subsequently varnished
Object type	Drawing > Two-dimensional object > Art object
Location	This object is in storage

Dimensions	Height 188 mm Width 325 mm
Artists	Attributed to: Jacopo de' Barbari
Accession number	D I 238 (PK)
Credits	Loan Cultural Heritage Agency of the Netherlands (former Koenigs collection), 2004
Department	Drawings & Prints
Acquisition date	2004
Creation date	in circa 1505-1515
Collector	Collector / Franz Koenigs
Provenance	Art dealer Julius W. Böhler (1883-1966), Lucerne; Franz W. Koenigs (1881-1941), Haarlem, acquired in 1929; D.G. van Beuningen (1877-1955), Rotterdam, acquired with the Koenigs Collection in 1940; unlawfully sold to the Nazi's in 1940; stored in Dresden (1941-45); seized by the Soviet Army’s Trophy Division; deposited in the Pushkin Museum, Moscow, and afterwards in the Bogdan & Varvara Khanenko Museum, Kyiv; restituted to The Netherlands by Ukraine in 2004; on loan from The Cultural Heritage Agency (RCE), 2004
Exhibitions	Rotterdam 2004a, no. 135; Rotterdam 2009 (Vogels)
Internal exhibitions	Prentenkabinet: Vogels van diverse pluimage (2009)
Research	Show research Italian Drawings 1400-1600
Literature	Vienna 1985, p. 46, fig. 6.2; Elen 2004, no. 135, ill. (Jacopo de' Barbari); Ferrari 2006, pp. 156-57, ill.
Material	Parchment > Skin > Animal material > Organic material > Material > Material and technique Varnish > Artist's material > Material > Material and technique Paintbrush > Artist's material > Material > Material and technique Black ink > Ink > Artist's material > Material > Material and technique Grey ink > Ink > Artist's material > Material > Material and technique Brown ink > Ink > Artist's material > Material > Material and technique Paper > Vegetable material > Organic material > Material > Material and technique
Object	Drawing > Two-dimensional object > Art object
Geographical origin	Italy > Southern Europe > Europe

Do you have corrections or additional information about this work? Please, send us a message

Entry catalogue Italian Drawings 1400-1600

Author: Gert Jan van der Sman

This drawing on parchment from the former Koenigs Collection has an attribution to Jacopo de’ Barbari, but has never been remarked on by art historians. It is one of the very few ‘non-German drawings’ restituted by Ukraine to the Netherlands in 2004, along with no fewer than 134 sheets by fifteenth- and sixteenth-century German artists.

The attribution to Jacopo de’ Barbari is based on its affinity with the famous drawing of a dead grey partridge that is held in London (c.1504).^[1] That study was made in watercolour on paper, with great attention to the subtle grey and brown shades of the plumage. But whereas the London drawing has a certain transparency that derives from the extremely fine brushwork, the present drawing is heavier in design and execution. Several factors contribute to this: the support (parchment instead of paper), the dark background, the white priming in the foreground and the quite strong dark patches on the jay’s head and left wing.

To date, there are no known drawings on parchment by Jacopo de’ Barbari, which means that the present sheet should be attributed to the artist with a degree of caution. The light and dark contrasts suggest the same. Nevertheless, there are style elements that link the drawing in Rotterdam with the work in London, particularly the use of parallel hatching on the jay’s breast.^[2]We find hatching of this kind in the shadow passages in the drawing in London. The arrangement of the picture space is also similar; as Jacopo de’ Barbari accentuated the vertical central axis in the London drawing, so here the emphasis is on the horizontal axis. Lastly, the use of colour in the Rotterdam drawing resembles De’ Barbari’s trompe-l’oeil painting Still Life with a Partridge and an Iron Glove in Munich, for which the sheet in London is probably a preliminary study.^[3]

In his dissertation on Jacopo de’ Barbari, Jay Levenson suggested that De’ Barbari made a number of studies of dead birds during his stay in Germany.^[4]The sheet from the Koenigs Collection may point in that direction. The artist chose here a pictorial finish so that the drawing could also serve as a work of art in its own right.

Footnotes

^[1]British Museum, inv. SL,5264.23, to be dated around 1504.

^[2]This hatching was partly blurred by the varnish applied later and is consequently hard to see in reproductions.

^[3] Alte Pinakothek, inv. 5066.

^[4]Levenson 1978, p. 202: ‘…we would prefer to think of the London sheet as the only survivor of what was surely an entire class of such studies by Jacopo’.

Show research Italian Drawings 1400-1600

Show catalogue entry Hide catalogue entry

All about the artist

Jacopo de' Barbari

Without a time slot you cannot visit the depot

Join as a Friend

One of the Seven Virtues: Temperantia (Temperance)

Sleeping Naked Woman in Bed, Study for the Lithograph 'Le Sommeil' (Sleep)

Death approaches a young woman

Leda and the Swan