Fox With Two Herons

Frans Snyders

ca. 1630–40 · Pen and brown ink, brush and brown wash, over traces of black chalk · Drawings and Prints

A close collaborator with Rubens, Snyders was a leading animal painter of his time and one of the first to represent Aesop's "Fables" on a large scale. This drawing is preparatory for an oil of about 1630-1640 that is now in the Memorial Art Gallery of the University of Rochester. The artist has freely combined elements from two fables: "The Fox and the Heron (or the stork)" and "The Frogs Who Asked for a King." The first story tells how the heron repays the fox's lack of hospitality by serving him a meal in a long-necked bottle from which he cannot eat. In the second, the frogs pester Zeus with repeated requests for a ruler and are given in succession a log, an eel and, finally, a heron. The last ruler gobbles them up one by one. The respective morals are "one bad turn deserves another" and "better no king than a bad one."

Artist

Frans Snyders

Date

ca. 1630–40

Medium

Pen and brown ink, brush and brown wash, over traces of black chalk

Department

Drawings and Prints

Credit line

Mary Oenslager Fund, 2001