THE HUNTERS

oil on canvas, laid on masonite panel

11.5 x 14.25 in. (29.2 x 36.2 cm)

Price Realized:

13200.00 CAD.

INCLUDES BUYER’S PREMIUM

Notes:

signed lower left; titled on the gallery labels (located on the backing board and verso on the masonite panel); les ateliers R.G./52, rue Bichat/Paris label located on the framing verso

Provenance: Dominion Gallery (Montreal QC), Inv. No. G6698; Former collection of John Thomson (Calgary AB); Former collection of Nels and Dora Carlson (Calgary AB) and by descent to the current consignor (Vernon BC)

Cornelius Krieghoff was born in Amsterdam in 1815 and immigrated to North America, landing in New York in 1837. He settled in Montreal in 1840 with Louise Gautier, whom he had met in New York and married. It was in Montreal that Krieghoff began his career in Canada as a working artist. In 1853, Krieghoff relocated to Quebec City at the urging of his friend, auctioneer John Budden, who would become one of his most ardent supporters and greatest friends over time. In Quebec City, between 1853 and 1862, Krieghoff truly achieved artistic success and established himself as a prominent painter of the romantic Canadian landscape.

From early on, Krieghoff’s experiences and interactions in Canada impacted the artist, and formed a deep fascination with the Indigenous Communities around him. He spent considerable time visiting the Kanien’kehá:ka community at the Chauganwa (Kahnawake) Reserve near Montreal and the Huron-Wendat community at what was then called the Lourette (now Wendake) Reserve near Quebec City, where he created numerous scenes depicting daily life and figural scenes of the people he encountered.

As the 1860s approached, Krieghoff also began producing an increased number of dramatic hunting scenes, exemplified in the aptly titled “The Hunters.” From his first winter in Quebec, Krieghoff joined his friends, colleagues, and patrons on hunting trips, often demonstrating his own skill as an expert marksman and painting scenes on the spot. Lac-Saint-Charles, just north of Quebec City, was a popular hunting ground and is the setting of many of Krieghoff’s hunting scenes during his time living in Quebec CIty. The dying animal, in this case a caribou, is a poignant narrative element, depicted here in its final moments of life. Krieghoff masterfully conveys the intense struggle for survival for all in 19th-century Quebec, against the unforgiving backdrop of a Canadian winter blizzard.