Melchior de Hondecoeter Melchior d'Hondecoeter (c. 1636 - April 3, 1695), Dutch animalier painter, was born in Utrecht and died in Amsterdam. After the start of his career, he painted virtually exclusively bird subjects, usually exotic or game, in park-like landscapes. Hondecoeter’s paintings featured geese (brent goose, Egyptian brent and red-breasted brent), fieldfares, partridges, pigeons, ducks, magpies and peacocks, but also African grey crowned cranes, Asian sarus cranes, Indonesian Yellow-crested Cockatoos, an Indonesian Purple-naped Lory and Grey-headed Lovebirds from Madagascar.