Artwork

Plate 36: Red-Breasted Merganser, Shoveler, and Mallard, and Duck with Artichokes

Plate 36: Red-Breasted Merganser, Shoveler, and Mallard, and Duck with Artichokes is a gouache drawing by the Renaissance artist Joris Hoefnagel. It dates from 1594 and is held in the collection of the National Gallery of Art. Executed on parchment around 1594, this circular composition combines watercolor with gold leaf.

About this work

Overview

Executed on parchment around 1594, this circular composition combines watercolor with gold leaf. Joris Hoefnagel, a Flemish draftsman active in natural-history illustration, rendered three species of waterfowl—red-breasted merganser, shoveler, and mallard—beside a flowering artichoke. The work exemplifies late-sixteenth-century interest in precise, observational depiction of flora and fauna.

Subject & Meaning

The sheet juxtaposes four labeled ducks with a single artichoke plant. Each bird is shown in profile or three-quarter view, swimming across a blue expanse that suggests a pond. The botanical element, positioned above the waterfowl, serves both as a decorative counterpoint and as a nod to the period’s growing enthusiasm for systematic botanical recording.

Technique & Style

Hoefnagel applied translucent watercolor washes to build subtle gradations of feather and leaf, reserving gold paint for the surrounding border. His brushwork remains fine enough to distinguish individual barbs on wing covert feathers and the serrated edges of artichoke bracts. The circular format and gold edging echo manuscript illumination conventions of the era.

History & Provenance

The drawing originates from Hoefnagel’s broader project of natural-history studies undertaken during his travels across Europe. It survives as one folio among a series of similar waterfowl and botanical sheets, though the exact sequence of ownership before modern institutional acquisition remains fragmentary.

Context

Created at the intersection of commerce and science, the work reflects Hoefnagel’s dual background as a merchant and artist. Northern European courts and collectors increasingly valued illustrated inventories of nature, and Hoefnagel’s output helped establish still-life and natural-history genres within the region’s artistic repertoire.

Legacy

The sheet contributes to the evolution of scientific illustration by merging artistic refinement with taxonomic clarity. Later naturalists and illustrators drew on such models, while art historians cite Hoefnagel’s meticulous approach as a bridge between medieval manuscript traditions and the empirical studies of the seventeenth century.