Giovanni Crivelli (known as Il Crivellino)
(Milan? – Parma, 1760)
Peacocks, Turkeys, and Roosters
Oil on canvas
129 × 175 cm (142 × 187 cm with frame)
Ebonized wood frame with gilded moldings
An important and dramatic composition of an animated still life, attributed to Giovanni Crivelli, one of the leading figures in 18th-century Lombard animal painting. The work is fully in keeping with the Baroque and late-Baroque decorative tradition, intended to adorn noble interiors with subjects of great visual and symbolic impact.
The scene unfolds with a theatrical arrangement: a group of farmyard animals—peacocks, turkeys, and roosters—is arranged in a carefully balanced composition, emerging from a dark, atmospheric background. The majestic peacock dominates the composition with its speckled, iridescent tail, flanked by turkeys with vivid red wattles and roosters with brilliant plumage, rendered with extraordinary naturalistic detail.
A painting of remarkable quality and substantial size, it represents a significant example of Crivelli's work, likely commissioned by an aristocratic patron and conceived as a decorative element of great prestige.
