Gabriel Alexandre Decamps
French, 1803–1860
The Poacher
c. 1847
A solitary poacher, his game bag stained with blood, walks through a snowy landscape clasping his hands in the cold. Decamps painted this image during a stay near the forest of Fontainebleau, a period when he felt frustrated by his lack of success in Paris. Perhaps the artist felt some sympathy for poachers, whose activities placed them on the edge of mainstream society.
| Medium | oil on canvas |
| Dimensions | 9 1/2 x 7 5/16 in. (24.1 x 18.6 cm) Frame: 17 1/8 x 15 x 2 1/8 in. (43.5 x 38.1 x 5.4 cm) |
| Object Number | 1955.700 |
| Acquisition | Acquired by Sterling and Francine Clark before 1955 |
| Status | Off View |
Image Caption
Gabriel Alexandre Decamps, The Poacher, c. 1847, oil on canvas. Clark Art Institute, 1955.700
Select Bibliography
Sterling and Francine Clark Art Institute. Exhibit Five: French Paintings of the 19th Century. Exhibition catalogue. Williamstown, MA: Sterling and Francine Clark Art Institute, 1956.
Cass, David B. and Michael M. Floss. Alexandre Gabriel Decamps, 1803-1860. Exhibition catalogue. Williamstown, MA: Sterling and Francine Clark Art Institute, 1984.
Sterling and Francine Clark Art Institute. List of Paintings in the Sterling and Francine Clark Art Institute. Williamstown, MA: Sterling and Francine Clark Art Institute, 1970.
Sterling and Francine Clark Art Institute. List of Paintings in the Sterling & Francine Clark Art Institute. Williamstown, MA: Sterling and Francine Clark Art Institute, 1972.
Dewey F. Mosby. Alexandre-Gabriel Decamps, 1803-1860, 2 vol.. Ph.D. diss. Harvard, 1973. New York: Garland.. 1977..
Sterling and Francine Clark Art Institute. List of Paintings in the Sterling and Francine Clark Art Institute. Williamstown, MA: Sterling and Francine Clark Art Institute, 1984.
Kern, Steven, ed. List of Paintings in the Sterling and Francine Clark Art Institute. Williamstown, MA: Sterling and Francine Clark Art Institute, 1992.
Lees, Sarah, ed. Nineteenth-Century European Paintings at the Sterling and Francine Clark Art Institute. Williamstown, MA: Sterling and Francine Clark Art Institute; New Haven and London: distributed by Yale University Press, 2012.
EUROPEAN PAINTINGS CATALOGUE ENTRY
Provenance
M. T. von Feldt; [Wildenstein, New York, sold to Clark, 27 Sept. 1945, as Le Braconnier]; Robert Sterling Clark (1945–55); Sterling and Francine Clark Art Institute, 1955.
