Hounds bringing down a bear

Although the Rotterdam born artist is known to have painted mythological, historical and topografical pictures, his oeuvre mainly consists of hunting scenes and depictions of fighting animals, such as the present lot. As pointed out by A. Hentzen, "Abraham Hondius" in Jahrbuch der Hamburger Kunstsammlungen, VIII, 1963, p.36, the artist was clearly influenced by the works of the Flemish painters Jan Fyt and Frans Snyders, whose oeuvre he probably knew through engravings. The present picture is typical for the works of the 1670's, in the large scale of the animals and in the emphasis the artist put on movement and on the strong light and dark contrasts. We are grateful to Dr. R. Fleischer, who has confirmed the authenticity of the present lot on the basis of a photograph and who agrees with a date to the 1670's, in a letter dated 13 December 1998. He compares it to the pendant pictures, signed and dated 1672, in the Boymans-Van Beuningen Museum, Rotterdam (A. Hentzen, op. cit., p.52, n0s57 & 58, figs 10 & 11).

See colour illustration