Adriaen VAN DER CABEL (1631 – 1705), Still Life With Game, Circa 1655–1659

Oil on canvas. Signed lower right: Adrianus van der Cabel fecit... 119 × 140 cm.

A Dutch painter trained in The Hague under Jan van Goyen, Adriaen van der Cabel stands as one of the most cosmopolitan figures in seventeenth-century landscape and still-life painting. Heir to the Northern realist tradition and open to the warmth of Southern light, he travelled to Italy around 1655 and stayed for several years in Lyon, where he eventually settled in 1666. Appointed Maître-Garde of the painters’ guild, he enjoyed a prolific career distinguished by his precision of drawing and the refined harmony of his colours.

Dating from his first Lyon period, this Still Life with a Bustard, Hare, Partridges and a Hunting Horn demonstrates the technical mastery van der Cabel achieved early in his career. The composition is arranged around a generous display of freshly hunted game: a bustard with wide-spread wings, a reclining hare, several partridges and smaller birds. On the left, a hunting horn and wicker basket introduce a domestic note and, in symbolic terms, evoke the aristocratic world of the hunt and the pleasures of the senses. In the background, a dog emerges discreetly from the shadows, linking the scene to the realm of the living.

A controlled lateral light crosses the composition diagonally, heightening the whiteness of feathers, the softness of fur and the cool sheen of metal. This dramatic chiaroscuro, inspired by Caravaggesque reminiscences, lends the subject a rare monumentality. Van der Cabel excels in rendering the physical presence of objects — the density of hair, the delicacy of plumage, the smoothness of copper. The scene is defined by a subtle balance between structural discipline and sensual richness, inviting the viewer’s eye to wander freely through an ordered pictorial space.

The painting reveals van der Cabel’s ability to unite the disciplined Northern gaze with the radiance of Italian light. Beyond the hunting theme, it becomes a meditation on matter and the transience of life, exalted by a warm palette of golden browns. The silent dignity of the game, the restraint of gesture and the depth of atmosphere make this work a major testimony to the Lyon school of Baroque painting imbued with Northern influence.

His works are represented in the Louvre Museum, as well as in the Museums of Fine Arts of Bordeaux, Grenoble, Nantes and Chambéry.

Provenance:
– Cabinet of art and natural history objects of Antoine-Nicolas Gavinet (d. 1795)
– Peysson family, Lyon
– Galerie Didier Aaron

Bibliography:
– Raoul de Cazenove, Études sur les peintres lyonnais au XVII? siècle, Paris, Rapilly, 1888.