Three chickens on brown ledge; one is dead hanging by its feet, one is a chick inside glass case, one adult spotted chicken
Artwork Details
Medium
Acrylic on Canvas
Context
Former Chicago artist Nancy Hild’s work reflects a considerable passion for women’s and animal rights issues while displaying a profound technical skill and handling of detail and color in her paintings and drawings. With references to Renaissance portraits and still lifes evident in their composition and content, works like North Avenue Madonna and Three Ages of Chickens place these contemporary themes within a much larger art historical context.
Acquisition
Accession
2018.02-05
Source or Donor
Linda James
Acquisition Method
Gift
Credit Line
Linda R. James
Made/Created
Artist
Hild, Nancy
Date made
1990
Inscription/Signature/Marks
Location
BR/R
Transcription
'N.Hild 1991'
Notes
Inscription Type: paint
Lexicon
Nomenclature 4.0
Nomenclature Primary Object Term
Painting
Nomenclature Class
Art
Nomenclature Category
Category 08: Communication Objects
Getty AAT
Concept
rural, culture-related concepts, birds (motifs), motifs, design elements (attributes)
Hierarchy Name
Associated Concepts (hierarchy name), Design Elements (hierarchy name)
Nancy Hild (1948-2017)
Three Ages of Chickens, 1990
Acrylic on Canvas
Collection of DePaul Art Museum; Gift of Linda R. James
2018.02
“Nancy Hild’s work combines humor and a matter-of-factness that is easy to understand and can be deciphered within seconds. Straight-forward paintings that combine elements of surrealism are right in the niche of the types of paintings I am drawn to and this piece plays heavily into the themes of the exhibition. I hope that guests to the museum ask themselves the same questions I did when I first saw this piece: ‘Which stage in this chicken’s life compares the most to my life at this moment?’ Yet, the more important question, delving deeper, might be: ‘When will I know when the cycle has repeated itself?’”
––Spencer Bolding, B.A. History of Art and Architecture.
