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For Sunday's Dinner

A plucked chicken, a few stray feathers remaining, hangs upside-down by one foot, illuminated. Behind it the metal hinges and wood panels of a door are visible.
CC0 Public Domain Designation

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  • A plucked chicken, a few stray feathers remaining, hangs upside-down by one foot, illuminated. Behind it the metal hinges and wood panels of a door are visible.

Date:

1888

Artist:

William Michael Harnett (American, born Ireland, 1848–1892)

About this artwork

Still-life painter William Michael Harnett excelled at trompe l’oeil, painting that fools the eye, through realistic depiction. In For Sunday’s Dinner, a chicken hangs in front of a painted door with its throat cut and most of its feathers plucked; a few remaining downy spots stand out against the puckered, pimpled flesh. The metal door hinges, on the right side of the canvas, frame the chicken and echo its form. The painting’s title and the rough, blemished surface of the door suggest a country dinner, the homey meal evoking nostalgia for a simpler past.

Status

Currently Off View

Department

Arts of the Americas

Artist

William Michael Harnett

Title

For Sunday's Dinner

Place

United States (Artist's nationality:)

Date  Dates are not always precisely known, but the Art Institute strives to present this information as consistently and legibly as possible. Dates may be represented as a range that spans decades, centuries, dynasties, or periods and may include qualifiers such as c. (circa) or BCE.

1888

Medium

Oil on canvas

Inscriptions

Signed and inscribed recto, bottom-left, in ochre pigment: "W/H/M ARNETT. / 1888.".

Dimensions

94.3 × 53.6 cm (37 1/8 × 21 1/8 in.)

Credit Line

Wilson L. Mead Fund

Reference Number

1958.296

IIIF Manifest  The International Image Interoperability Framework (IIIF) represents a set of open standards that enables rich access to digital media from libraries, archives, museums, and other cultural institutions around the world.

Learn more.

https://api.artic.edu/api/v1/artworks/111377/manifest.json

Extended information about this artwork

Object information is a work in progress and may be updated as new research findings emerge. To help improve this record, please email . Information about image downloads and licensing is available here.

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