A Goose and a Gander with their Goslings Honking in Alarm as Two Foxes with their Cubs Emerge from the Rushes

Johann Heinrich Wilhelm Tischbein

mid-18th–early 19th century · Pen and brown ink, brush and brown and gray wash over black chalk, watercolor and bodycolor · Drawings and Prints

Impending violence contrasts with a lushly serene natural setting in this highly finished drawing of foxes threatening a family of geese. The image derives either from "Gänsegeschichten" (The Legend of the Geese), a fable the artist wrote around 1803, or from Goethe's more famous "Reineke Fuchs." Intended as a satirical commentary upon human folly, the work demonstrates how the close literary friendship established between Tischbein and Goethe in Italy continued after both had returned to Germany.

Artist

Johann Heinrich Wilhelm Tischbein

Date

mid-18th–early 19th century

Medium

Pen and brown ink, brush and brown and gray wash over black chalk, watercolor and bodycolor

Department

Drawings and Prints

Credit line

Purchase, Didier Aaron Inc. Gift, 2003