Rabbit and Copper Pot

Chardin's 'Rabbit and Copper Pot', dated 1650 in the records but almost certainly a much later work given the artist's dates (1699–1779), is held at the Nationalmuseum in Stockholm. The date is likely a cataloguing error or misreading; the style and subject are entirely consistent with Chardin's mature kitchen still lifes of the 1730s–1750s. The combination of a dead rabbit with a copper pot is characteristic of his hunting-larder compositions, pairing an animal subject with a domestic utensil in a way that bridges the trophy tradition and the kitchen-table still life. The Nationalmuseum's substantial Chardin holdings reflect the systematic purchasing of French art by Swedish institutions during the eighteenth century, when Chardin's work was widely prized across Northern Europe.

The rabbit's fur is rendered with the directional, layered stroke technique Chardin applied consistently to animal subjects — warm and cool whites and greys following the lie of the coat to suggest texture and volume simultaneously. The copper pot provides the warm metallic contrast he deployed in virtually all kitchen compositions, its surface built up through glazes over a warm ground with precise highlight placement.