The Cockerel

In The Cockerel, Ryback's bird bears comparison both with the romantic folkloric imagery of artists such as Chagall, and the expressionistic realism of Soutine's closely-observed studies. The cockerel, a staple of the French still-life, may be a symbol of his adopted French home, but also evokes the Jewish tradition of kapparot, where the sins of a person are symbolically transferred to a fowl. Le Repos, Ryback's sensitively-observed study of a horse at rest by is animated by a vivid palette and the beautifully rendered landscape which surrounds it.