Jacob Hoefnagel (1575–ca. 1630), Orpheus Charming the Animals
, 1613, Watercolor and gouache, heightened with white gouache, over traces of black chalk, on vellum mounted on panel, bordered in gold, Purchased on the Sunny Crawford von Bülow Fund 1978
, 1998.22
Court painter to Rudolf II in Prague from 1602 to 1613, Hoefnagel specialized in small format mythological scenes on vellum or copper. This drawing is such a work, and its date and exquisite finish suggest that it may have been a courtly commission. The subject was popular in northern European art in the late sixteenth and early seventeenth centuries, reflecting the vogue for encyclopedic representations of nature.