# A Camel

- By: Cornelis Saftleven (Dutch, 1607-1681)
- Date: 1646
- Medium: Black chalk and brush and black wash, with touches of brown and ochre chalk, on ivory laid paper
- Classification: Drawing and Watercolor
- Dimensions: 20.4 × 31.3 cm (8 1/16 × 12 3/8 in.)
- Culture: Holland
- Credit line: Clarence Buckingham Collection
- Museum: [Art Institute of Chicago](https://www.artic.edu/artworks/74217)
- Rights: [Public domain (CC0)](https://creativecommons.org/publicdomain/zero/1.0/)
- Picture: https://invisiblenetwork.ai/thumbs/web/48ea7e1dc0ca01a60cdc5879a15fe6a0.jpg
- Who can see it: Little Ones profiles and older (museums give no ratings; placed by Invisible Network from the museum's own words)

Although foreign to Europe, camels and other non-native animals were sometimes displayed as curiosities on the continent. Cornelis Saftleven recorded one such rare encounter, capturing the animal’s fur by using a combination of black, brown, and ocher chalk, in some areas (the head and haunches) wetting the media to create denser passages in contrast to the dryer, more disperse use of chalk elsewhere. The addition of ink wash added further shading to suggest the volumes of the camel’s body.

Description © Art Institute of Chicago, CC BY 4.0