(Antwerp 1636–1701 Brussels)
A hare and game birds with two spaniels, with a landscape beyond,
oil on canvas, 94.5 x 133.5 cm, framed

The present painting was confirmed as an autograph work by David de Coninck by Fred G. Meijer.

In the centre of the composition there is a lid basket with several singing birds underneath an oak tree. Lying on the ground there are more birds, a drake and a hare hanging from a branch of the tree. Two spaniels watch over the game very carefully. A hunting rifle leans against a tree, next to a hunting horn. The scenery is framed by ivy, blackberry bushes and thistles and a wide landscape opens towards a distant ridge.

David de Coninck was an adept painter of animal scenes and landscapes, especially of birds and dogs that appear in many of his paintings like in Dead birds and game with gun dogs and a little owl in The National Gallery, London.

De Coninck was apprenticed in 1659 in Antwerp to Pieter Boel and in 1663 became a master in the Antwerp Guild of Saint Luke. Afterwards he went to Paris, working with Flemish animal painter Nicasius Bernaerts who was working for the Royal Court and was a member of the Royal Academy for Painting and Sculpture in Paris. From 1671 to 1694 he was living in Rome, where he was a member of the circle of Dutch and Flemish painters who called themselves the Bentvueghels. After a stay in Vienna he returned to Flanders and went to Brussels around 1701, where he became a master in the Brussels Guild of Saint Luke.