GENERAL DESCRIPTION
Gustave Courbet’s Fox in the Snow depicts the animal mauling its prey, the rodent’s blood spilling onto the blanket of snow. The brutality of this image is intensified by the brilliance and directness of Courbet’s brush stroke. Here he uses brush and palette knife to differentiate between the crisp, white terrain landscape and the fox’s soft, red fur. This painting is a quintessential example of Courbet’s realism: he refused to depict traditional subjects of mythology or history and was instead intensely fascinated with subjects of everyday life.
The crouching fox at the center of a snowy landscape commands our attention, and it is only at second glance that we notice his prey, a dormouse in the process of being dismembered by the fox’s rapacious jaws. Courbet himself was an avid hunter, and the accuracy of the scene likely derives from his own experiences in the rugged countryside of his native village of Ornans in the east of France. The vivid and unsentimental treatment of violence is typical of Courbet’s animal paintings and hunting scenes, and the fox, both as predator and prey, would become a recurrent motif in the 1860s. During these years, Courbet produced many landscapes, and snow scenes were his specialty.
Courbet exhibited his first hunting scene, which earned both critical and popular praise at the Paris Salon of 1857. Fox in the Snow was first shown in Besançon, near Courbet’s hometown, and critics felt that the local audience had a special appreciation for the fidelity with which Courbet captured the landscapes of the region. The painting continued to receive positive acclaim when shown at the French Salon of 1861.
Adapted from
- Heather MacDonald, DMA Label copy, November 2008.
- Dorothy Kosinski, "Gustave Courbet's 'Fox in the Snow'," in Dallas Museum of Art: A Guide to the Collection , ed. Charles Venable (New Haven, NJ: Yale University Press, 1997), 102.
- Bonnie Pitman, ed., Dallas Museum of Art: A Guide to the Collection (New Haven, CT: Yale University Press, 2012), 190.
NOTES
Inserted 2012 Guide essay into the text field in TMS and entered author/date information for existing text entries.
The object file contains a 2010 research document that updates the 2001 document attached to the TMS record. I confirmed the provenance in TMS but did not go through the published references or exhibition history to make sure TMS matches the updated research document.
Teaching resources from Connect? and Ideas Take Shape teaching packet.
FUN FACTS- source- (From Label copy, 1993)
Due to time constraints, I am removing the following text from "archival resources" and also removing the %UMO pending tag:
NOT DIGITIZED- Images, 200X.016- Photograph Collection, 1900-2003, Box 41- Folder 47, Installing Gustave Courbet's "Fox in the Snow" 1979.
Removed TMS tag because rule exists.
This note was previously tagged #routed (and possibly !Routed_Feb15). I am removing those tags and replacing with #draft so that this note proceeds to GDocs for routing and is harvested to Brain. (EAS, 12/19/2016)
Provenance (not public)
1861: Commission for the Lottery, Paris, France [1]
Around 1861-1868: Khalil Bey, Paris, purchase from the above [2]
Until 1880: Martin Coster, Paris, until May 1880 [3]
Until 1919: M. M. Lange, Paris, until February 1919 [4]
By 1939-1979: Private Collection, Switzerland [5]
From 1979: Dallas Museum of Fine Arts, Foundation for the Arts Collection, Mrs. John B. O’Hara Fund, purchased from the above through Wildenstein, Paris [6] [7]
NOTES:
1. “Purchased for 1800 francs from the Salon exhibition for their annual benefit lottery. The letter from Courbet to his parents, citing this sale, was sold in Paris, Hotel Drouot, “Vente Alfred Dupont,” part 2, June 18-19, 1957, 32, and is now in the collection of Les Amis de Gustave Courbet, Paris and Ornans.” This excerpt is found in the documentation in the Collections Records Object File.
2. According to documentation in the object file, Bey purchased the painting from the lottery sale. He was the former ambassador from Constantinople to St. Petersburg who was at that time retired and living in Paris. He later declared bankruptcy and sold his collection at auction in 1868. Paris, Hotel Drouot, “Khalil Bey Sale,” January 16-18, 1868, 9.
3. Paris, “Martin Coster Sale,” May 10, 1880, 15.
4. Paris, Galerie Georges Petit, “M.M. Lange Sale,” February 26-27, 1919, 5 (illus.).
5. The 1938 exhibition at Rosenberg & Helft assigns ownership to a private collector. However, Lange is mentioned as a previous owner, therefore it can be assumed that the painting passed from Lange to the private Swiss collector prior to 1938.
6. The name of the Dallas Museum of Fine Arts, founded in 1933, was changed to the Dallas Museum of Art in 1983.
7. The Foundation for the Arts is a non-profit corporation created as a title-holding entity to serve the people of Dallas but to operate independently of the City. The Dallas Museum of Art (at its own cost) is responsible for the care, storage, insurance, conservation and maintenance of the collection, and agrees to maintain the highest museum standards in the management and handling of the Foundation’s collection. The title to all works of art purchased or otherwise acquired by the Foundation for the Arts is retained by the Foundation.
Catalogue essays
Artist/designers
Cultures
Geography
Besançon (France)- exhibited
Depicted location: Ornans (France): TGN: 7009418
Place of origin: Paris (France): TGN: 7008038
Process/materials
palette knife
Historical periods
Individuals
Subject terms
blood
fox
rat
rocks
snow
landscape
trees
violence
hunting
winter
nature
predator
prey
white
Darwin, Charles
RELATED OBJECTS
PROVENANCE
AUDIO ASSETS
VIDEO ASSETS
IMAGE ASSETS
WEB RESOURCES
- Recountering the Collection: Gustave Courbet's Fox in the Snow at the Dallas Museum of Art~ Read Peter Simek's article for D Magazine, June 9, 2011.
ARCHIVAL RESOURCES
FUN FACTS
- When Fox in the Snow appeared in the Salon of 1861, it was selected by the state-run lottery commission for their annual benefit lottery sale; Khalil Bey, former Turkish Ambassador to the Court of the Czar, added it to his important collection of contemporary masters. He later declared bankruptcy and sold his collection at auction in 1868.
TEACHING IDEAS
RULES
Apply to objects where number equals 1979.7.FA
Category
rules_operator
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General Description
Gustave Courbet’s Fox in the Snow depicts the animal mauling its prey, the rodent’s blood spilling onto the blanket of snow. The brutality of this image is intensified by the brilliance and directness of Courbet’s brush stroke. Here he uses brush and palette knife to differentiate between the crisp, white terrain landscape and the fox’s soft, red fur. This painting is a quintessential example of Courbet’s realism: he refused to depict traditional subjects of mythology or history and was instead intensely fascinated with subjects of everyday life.
The crouching fox at the center of a snowy landscape commands our attention, and it is only at second glance that we notice his prey, a dormouse in the process of being dismembered by the fox’s rapacious jaws. Courbet himself was an avid hunter, and the accuracy of the scene likely derives from his own experiences in the rugged countryside of his native village of Ornans in the east of France. The vivid and unsentimental treatment of violence is typical of Courbet’s animal paintings and hunting scenes, and the fox, both as predator and prey, would become a recurrent motif in the 1860s. During these years, Courbet produced many landscapes, and snow scenes were his specialty.
Courbet exhibited his first hunting scene, which earned both critical and popular praise at the Paris Salon of 1857. Fox in the Snow was first shown in Besançon, near Courbet’s hometown, and critics felt that the local audience had a special appreciation for the fidelity with which Courbet captured the landscapes of the region. The painting continued to receive positive acclaim when shown at the French Salon of 1861.
Adapted from
- Heather MacDonald, DMA Label copy, November 2008.
- Dorothy Kosinski, "Gustave Courbet's 'Fox in the Snow'," in Dallas Museum of Art: A Guide to the Collection , ed. Charles Venable (New Haven, NJ: Yale University Press, 1997), 102.
- Bonnie Pitman, ed., Dallas Museum of Art: A Guide to the Collection (New Haven, CT: Yale University Press, 2012), 190.
Fun Facts
- When Fox in the Snow appeared in the Salon of 1861, it was selected by the state-run lottery commission for their annual benefit lottery sale; Khalil Bey, former Turkish Ambassador to the Court of the Czar, added it to his important collection of contemporary masters. He later declared bankruptcy and sold his collection at auction in 1868.
Archival Resources
Web Resources
- Recountering the Collection: Gustave Courbet's Fox in the Snow at the Dallas Museum of Art~ Read Peter Simek's article for D Magazine, June 9, 2011.
Notes
:
1. “Purchased for 1800 francs from the Salon exhibition for their annual benefit lottery. The letter from Courbet to his parents, citing this sale, was sold in Paris, Hotel Drouot, “Vente Alfred Dupont,” part 2, June 18-19, 1957, 32, and is now in the collection of Les Amis de Gustave Courbet, Paris and Ornans.” This excerpt is found in the documentation in the Collections Records Object File.
2. According to documentation in the object file, Bey purchased the painting from the lottery sale. He was the former ambassador from Constantinople to St. Petersburg who was at that time retired and living in Paris. He later declared bankruptcy and sold his collection at auction in 1868. Paris, Hotel Drouot, “Khalil Bey Sale,” January 16-18, 1868, 9.
3. Paris, “Martin Coster Sale,” May 10, 1880, 15.
4. Paris, Galerie Georges Petit, “M.M. Lange Sale,” February 26-27, 1919, 5 (illus.).
5. The 1938 exhibition at Rosenberg & Helft assigns ownership to a private collector. However, Lange is mentioned as a previous owner, therefore it can be assumed that the painting passed from Lange to the private Swiss collector prior to 1938.
6. The name of the Dallas Museum of Fine Arts, founded in 1933, was changed to the Dallas Museum of Art in 1983.
7. The Foundation for the Arts is a non-profit corporation created as a title-holding entity to serve the people of Dallas but to operate independently of the City. The Dallas Museum of Art (at its own cost) is responsible for the care, storage, insurance, conservation and maintenance of the collection, and agrees to maintain the highest museum standards in the management and handling of the Foundation’s collection. The title to all works of art purchased or otherwise acquired by the Foundation for the Arts is retained by the Foundation.
Catalogue essays
Artist/designers
Cultures
Geography
Besançon (France)- exhibited
Depicted location: Ornans (France): TGN: 7009418
Place of origin: Paris (France): TGN: 7008038
Process/materials
palette knife
Historical periods
Individuals
Subject terms
blood
fox
rat
rocks
snow
landscape
trees
violence
hunting
winter
nature
predator
prey
white
Darwin, Charles
RELATED OBJECTS
PROVENANCE
AUDIO ASSETS
VIDEO ASSETS
rules
Apply To
Objects
number
Equals
1979.7.FA
source file
object_notes_2_c-0142.xml.nores