# Still Life with Monkey, Fruits, and Flowers

- By: Jean-Baptiste Oudry (French, 1686–1755)
- Date: 1724
- Medium: Oil on canvas
- Classification: Painting
- Dimensions: 141.6 × 144.8 cm (55 3/4 × 57 in.); Framed: 172.8 × 175.3 × 12.7 cm (68 × 69 × 5 in.)
- Culture: France
- Credit line: Major Acquisitions Centennial Fund
- Museum: [Art Institute of Chicago](https://www.artic.edu/artworks/94126)
- Rights: [Public domain (CC0)](https://creativecommons.org/publicdomain/zero/1.0/)
- Picture: https://www.artic.edu/iiif/2/293ab61e-5536-c2d3-936a-4116f027260c/full/!1920,1080/0/default.jpg
- Who can see it: Little Ones profiles and older (museums give no ratings; placed by Invisible Network from the museum's own words)

Jean-Baptiste Oudry received numerous commissions from Louis XV of France, who admired his skill as a painter of animals and still lifes. The artist frequently combined his two specialties, as in this work, in which a monkey, an animal celebrated in this period for its mischievous and lustful character, snatches a few grapes. The French Rococo taste for the sensual is manifest in the lush, overripe quality of the fruits and flowers, reminiscent of 17th-century Flemish works that Oudry is known to have studied. Paintings such as this typically adorned dining rooms as part of an overall decorative scheme.

Description © Art Institute of Chicago, CC BY 4.0