Original works of art

Paul de Vos was from a Flemish family of artists who moved from Hulst to Antwerp in 1596, among whom the brothers, Cornelius de Vos, Jan de Vos and Paul de Vos became painters, beginning their training as apprentices to the Antwerp painter, David Remeeus (1559-1626). In 1611 their eldest sister, Margaretha, married Frans Snyders, the animal painter and assistant to Rubens.

The early work of de Vos is heavily reliant on Snyders for its subject matter, composition and individual motifs, but he eventually developed his own style, preferring a somewhat chaotic composition, full of turbulent movement. The brushwork of de Vos is broader than that of Snyders, and his palette somewhat more integrated, with use of a warmer, yellowish middle tone. Both Snyders and de Vos were known for their use of gruesome detail. In his scenes of pantries, quarreling dogs, birds and fighting animals, Paul de Vos followed close on the heels of Snyders, but he also enriched this iconographic tradition with scenes of fighting cats and horses attacked by wolves.

De Vos himself often called on other artists to collaborate with him, and relied on landscape artist, Jan Wildens, for many of his backgrounds.. For Rubens, as well as Snyders, it was de Vos who often completed the animals in hunting scenes, and the armor, in his allegories of war.