Existing comment:
William Ranney
Wounded Hound, 1850
In the 1840s and 1850s, Ranney gained acclaim for his genre scenes of trappers, mountain men, and hunters. He employed Old World artistic traditions to celebrate the pioneering spirit and natural resources of the New World. Here, he pictures a man kneeling to examine an injured hunting dog. She sits trustingly under his care while another hunter looks on. The reassuring stability of their composition, with its monumental figures and steady light source, suggests a positive outcome to the day's mishap. The Bible-literate audience of the era may have also recognized an allusion to the Good Shepherd.
Ranney had firsthand knowledge of frontier life, having served with the army of the Republic of Texas in its war against Mexico. The artist later created his paintings in a New Jersey studio filled, as one eye witness recorded, with "old flint-lock guns, pistols... saddles and riding gear... belonging to the early history of our land." |