Peacock, Dead Game and Monkey

The Wallace Collection has one of the world’s largest collections of game pieces by Jan Weenix. They typically represent dead game displayed beside classical urns or statues, set against distant views of lush landscapes or formal gardens. Weenix’s paintings were initially acquired by wealthy Amsterdam burghers. At the turn of the eighteenth century his reputation attracted the attention of Johann Wilhelm von der Pfalz, the German Elector Palatine in Düsseldorf, for whom he produced numerous game pieces and large still lifes from 1702 until about 1714. Four paintings by Weenix in the Great Gallery (P98, P124, P140, P182) were acquired by the 4th Marquess of Hertford from the Counts von Schönborn sale in 1867. In this theatrical composition, Weenix depicts a peacock and a springer spaniel standing guard over a still life of a dead goose, a doe, a pheasant, partridge and a bullfinch, while a monkey steals grapes from a basket of fruit in the foreground. In the ornamental garden, a hunter carries a hare and a basket of game birds.