This elegant still life depicts two common shelducks (Tadorna tadorna) hanging from a fantastical bracket, rendered so lifelike as to create a trompe-l'oeil effect against the neutral background. Medici inventories of the seventeenth century describe two still lifes of hanging waterfowl by Cesare Dandini and Giusto Suttermans, and since 1989 the present lot has been thought to be the one by Suttermans. However, it is now possible to securely attribute the present work to Dandini, and its pendant, hanging at the Uffizi as the work of Dandini, to Suttermans. The Still life of two shelducks was first recorded in the 1647 inventory of Cardinal Giovan Carlo de' Medici at the Casino di Via della Scala. Since it did not appear in an earlier inventory taken in 1637, it must have been acquired after that date. The elegant technique and choice of species both reflect its purpose as a hunting trophy painted for a wealthy and powerful patron.

Mina Gregori identified the Uffizi canvas (fig. 1) in 1964 as a still life mentioned in the 1649 inventory of don Lorenzo de’ Medici’s collects ion at Villa Petraia, with an attribution to Suttermans that is repeated in inventories taken in 1671 and 1760. It was later suggested that the Uffizi canvas could also be the work of Cesare Dandini mentioned in the 1647 and 1663 inventories of Cardinal Gian Carlo de Medici’s collects ion. Since the 1980s, this idea has been repeated by scholars, and the Uffizi painting is currently given to Dandini. This general consensus led Shirley Perlove to publish the present painting as the one by Suttermans cited in the Villa Petraia inventories. However the number “131” painted on the reverse of the Uffizi canvas corresponds instead to the one assigned to Suttermans work in the 1760 Villa Petraia inventory, and the present lot fits much more securely into the oeuvre of Cesare Dandini as Sandro Bellesi pointed out in 2007. It is thus possible to identify this lot with the painting mentioned in Cardinal Gian Carlo’s collects ion at the Villa della Scala in 1647.¹

The fanciful rack from which the shelducks hang is an important clue to the still life’s authorship. The rack in the Uffizi canvas is rendered in a straightforward manner based on observation, compatible in Lisa Goldenberg’s opinion with Suttermans’ style. By comparison the rack in the present lot is much more elaborate and imaginative: the left side terminates in a winged female figure and the right side in a dragon with its tongue extended. The way the light plays across the curling forms gives the rack an ethereal appearance much like the adornment on the gilded vase and the sauce bowl in the foreground of Dandini’s Artemisia, painted for Bartolomeo Corsini (fig. 2).

Still lifes of waterfowl were often painted as hunting trophies for European elite in the seventeenth century, and the subject reflects Cardinal Gian Carlo de’ Medici’s great love of hunting. The shelduck is rare in Italy and would have made an impressive trophy, but as game it was intended only for show as its meat has a pungent smell that makes it inedible. It was not uncommon for the Medici to display game birds during festivities and to give birds and game as gifts. As Perlove pointed out, the birds here are identified as male (sheldrakes) by their coloring of burnt sienna on the breast and of white and black on the neck and wings. The level of accuracy even extends to a green tint on the coverts, which comes from dragging the birds through green vegetation.²

We are grateful to Dr. Lisa Goldenberg Stoppato for informing us that this painting has been re-attributed to Dandini and for her assistance in cataloguing this lot. Her full report is available on request.

1. The height of the Dandini painting listed in the 1647 inventory converts to 87.45 cm, which is only slightly larger than the actual size of the painting under consideration. Based on the composition, the present lot has likely been cut down on one or both sides and perhaps also on the bottom. It is hard to determine whether it may have been cut down when Gian Carlo’s possessions were sold off shortly after his death to repay his debts.

2. See Perlove 1989, p. 411.