![]() The Subject: The subject has been identified as various types of dog. 2), which may be that of Georgiana, Duchess of Bedford (1781–1853), sister of the Duke of Gordon, who was one of Landseer’s most loyal patrons and possibly also his mistress. An infrared reflectogram of A Deerhound reveals, beneath the paint, a drawing of a woman’s head (fig. This monumental canvas, made near the outset of Landseer’s engagement with the Scottish Highlands, was one of his first aristocratic hunting portraits, and a milestone in his rise to prominence. The same dog appears, nuzzling under the hand of its master, George Gordon, 5th Duke of Gordon (1770–1836), in Scene in the Highlands, with Portraits of the Duchess of Bedford, the Duke of Gordon and Lord Alexander Russell (see fig. The present example is unusual in that it can be directly connected to a more ambitious composition. The picture may be classed among the small oils on board which served the artist as a means to explore his subjects and hone his technique. Landseer depicted the dog with great sensitivity, using delicate brushstrokes, while treating the background landscape more freely. The Painting: This painting depicts a deerhound, which were bred to hunt deer by running them down, a method known as coursing or deer stalking. His best paintings present the Highlands, and especially its pastime of deer hunting, as a paradigm of primal qualities: wild splendor juxtaposed with violent death. ![]() Landseer, a perennial visitor to the Highlands since 1824, was among the first painters to carry forward this Romantic vision in his art. Many of Landseer’s works are set in the Scottish Highlands, a rugged region in northwest Scotland that was immortalized in the nineteenth-century imagination as a place of untamed natural beauty and rustic tradition, most prominently in the novels of Sir Walter Scott (1771–1832). His popular appeal owed much to his charmingly sympathetic portrayals of beloved pets, but his ambition is most evident in his images of wild animals, which possess a vitality and emotional drama that epitomize his era’s attunement to the natural world. Landseer’s paintings were esteemed by the artistic establishment and noble patrons, including Queen Victoria herself. ![]() He invigorated this cherished British artistic tradition with a brilliantly naturalistic style, borne of his prodigious technical skill, honed through rigorous observation, and intensified and elevated by the study of exemplars such as Peter Paul Rubens (see The Met 1990.75) and Frans Snyders (The Met 2001.112). He died in London on 22 July 1879, leaving 10,000 guineas to the Royal Academy to fund scholarships.The Artist: Landseer earned success as a painter of animal subjects, most notably dogs and deer, with a specialty in hunting scenes. While under Haydon's instruction he also made a series of detailed anatomical drawings. and his Adherents before the Battle of Edgehill, Clarissa Harlowe in the Prison Room of the Sheriff's Office (1833, now in the collection of the Tate Gallery), The Pillaging of a Jew's House in the Reign of Richard I (1839, Tate Gallery) and The Temptation of Andrew Marvel (1841). His works included The Meeting of Charles I. He paid close attention to the historical accuracy of the accessories and details in his paintings. Most of his pictures were of subjects from British history, or from literature. In 1851, he was appointed Keeper of the Royal Academy, a post requiring him to teach in the "Antique School". He became an associate in of the Royal Academy in 1837, and a full academician in 1845. Many of the drawings he made on the journey were shown at the British Institution in 1828. In 1823 he accompanied Sir Charles Stuart de Rothesay on a diplomatic mission to Portugal and Brazil. He was awarded the silver palette of the Royal Society of Arts for a drawing of Laocoon in 1815, and in 1816 he entered the Royal Academy Schools where he was taught by Henry Fuseli. ![]() He trained under his father, and the painter Benjamin Robert Haydon. He was born in London on 12 August 1799, the second son of the engraver John Landseer, and the elder brother of the animal painter, Sir Edwin Landseer. Charles Landseer's Cromwell reading a letter found in Charles's Cabinet, after Naseby Alte Nationalgalerie, Berlin.
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