Animal in front of Noah's Ark (1680) Painting by Melchior D'Hondecoeter

Melchior d'Hondecoeter was a Dutch animalier painter who was born around 1636 and died on April 3, 1695. He was born in Utrecht and died in Amsterdam. After he first started painting, he almost always painted birds, usually exotic or wild ones, in park-like settings. Hondecoeter's paintings included geese (brent goose, Egyptian goose, and red-breasted goose), fieldfares, partridges, pigeons, ducks, northern cardinals, magpies, and peacocks, as well as African grey-crowned cranes, Asian sarus cranes, Indonesian yellow-crested cockatoos, an Indonesian purple-naped lory, and grey-headed lovebirds from Madagascar.
He grew up in an artistic environment because his grandfather was the painter Gillis d'Hondecoeter and his father was Gijsbert d'Hondecoeter, whose sister Josina married Jan Baptist Weenix. Arnold Houbraken's friend Jan Weenix, who is Melchior's cousin, told him that when Melchior was young, he was very religious and prayed very loudly. His mother and uncle weren't sure if they should train him to be a painter or a minister.
Hondecoeter began his career as an expert in something other than what he is known for now. Mr. de Stuers says that he made pieces for the sea. The Herzog Anton Ulrich Museum has Tub with Fish, which he made in 1655 and is one of his earliest works. Hondecoeter soon gave up fishing for chickens. He became famous as a painter of only birds. Unlike Johannes Fyt, he didn't just paint birds as trophies for the gamekeeper after a day of shooting or as items in a butcher's shop. Instead, he painted them as living creatures with feelings, fears, and fights, just like naturalists say birds do. Even though Fyt's Dutch rival doesn't have the brilliant tone and high finish of Fyt, his birds are full of action, and Burger says that Hondecoeter shows the motherhood of the hen with as much tenderness and feeling as Raphael shows the motherhood of Madonnas. But Fyt, who was Snyder's student, was comfortable drawing both the fur and feathers of deer and ducks. Hondecoeter worked in a smaller area and rarely did more than a cockfight or a show of birds.

• Nationality: NETHERLANDS
• Date of birth : unknown date
• Artistic domains: Represented by a Gallery,
• Groups: Contemporary Dutch Artists Artists presented by a gallery