Wyjazd na polowanie z sokołem

Wyjazd na polowanie z sokołem (Setting Out for the Falcon Hunt) of 1868 in watercolour draws on the ancient tradition of falconry as an aristocratic sport deeply rooted in Polish noble culture. Falconry had been practised by the Polish-Lithuanian nobility since the Middle Ages and remained a marker of elite leisure culture into the nineteenth century. By depicting the departure for a falcon hunt — riders, horses, and the birds themselves — Kossak engaged with the nostalgic dimension of Polish Romantic culture, which mourned the passing of the noble way of life under the pressures of partition and modernisation. The picturesque costume of the szlachta (nobility) at the hunt, the horses, and the falcon as a symbol of controlled wild power gave the painter rich material. The Upper Silesian Museum in Bytom holds the work as part of its collection of Polish Romantic art.

Watercolour suited the luminous outdoor light of a hunting departure: crisp morning air, colourful costume, the energy of horses impatient to move. Kossak's handling of the watercolour is confident and fluent, the horses rendered with characteristic anatomical precision while the falcons — technically demanding subjects — are given careful attention as the defining details of the subject.