Lot Essay
There are three studies for this picture (see H. Voss, op. cit., p. 261).
Phantastische Jagd was executed in 1890 when Stuck was 27 and it was among the first of the artist's works to be exhibited in public that same year in Munich. The work also plays an integral part in the artist's oeuvre: it anticipates many of the elements which placed Stuck among the most notable of the artistic avant-garde of his time.
The subject of Phantastische Jagd is one which Stuck returned to time and again throughout his career. Early on, the artist became fascinated with mythology, as did his contemporaries Franz von Lenbach and Arnold Böcklin (the latter was to have a profound impact on Stuck's artistic output), and this keen interest can be traced back to his professional beginnings as an illustrator and in his graphic work. Between 1882 and 1884 he produced a series of zincographs for the Viennese publishers Gerlach and Schenk, entitled Allegorien und Embleme where we first see the appearance of these mythological characters.
In the present work, Stuck explores composition and representation of human form, both elements in his work which he would refine throughout his career, as the previous lot indicates. Still employing a degree of naturalism in the fine handling of the back and foregrounds and the subtle usage of shades of brown and green, Phantastische Jagd already shows signs of Stuck as a mature artist. The severely rectangular canvas functions as an optical tool to enhance the drama of the chase - this foreshadows Stuck's preoccupation in later years with the decorative aspect of both canvas and frame in his work. In his monochromatic colour scheme, he draws the viewers attention to the central figures, thereby simplifying the composition and doing away with other superfluous narrative detail. The highly sculptural forms of centaur's figures become the focus at the moment of the arrow's fatal impact.
Stuck's work was clearly a reaction to the confines of the Künstlergenossenschaft in Munich, who still defined artistic competence by means of stringent academic history painting. Stuck's originality and individuality as an artist, as this early work illustrates, became a benchmark for a new generation of artists at the turn of the century.
Phantastische Jagd was executed in 1890 when Stuck was 27 and it was among the first of the artist's works to be exhibited in public that same year in Munich. The work also plays an integral part in the artist's oeuvre: it anticipates many of the elements which placed Stuck among the most notable of the artistic avant-garde of his time.
The subject of Phantastische Jagd is one which Stuck returned to time and again throughout his career. Early on, the artist became fascinated with mythology, as did his contemporaries Franz von Lenbach and Arnold Böcklin (the latter was to have a profound impact on Stuck's artistic output), and this keen interest can be traced back to his professional beginnings as an illustrator and in his graphic work. Between 1882 and 1884 he produced a series of zincographs for the Viennese publishers Gerlach and Schenk, entitled Allegorien und Embleme where we first see the appearance of these mythological characters.
In the present work, Stuck explores composition and representation of human form, both elements in his work which he would refine throughout his career, as the previous lot indicates. Still employing a degree of naturalism in the fine handling of the back and foregrounds and the subtle usage of shades of brown and green, Phantastische Jagd already shows signs of Stuck as a mature artist. The severely rectangular canvas functions as an optical tool to enhance the drama of the chase - this foreshadows Stuck's preoccupation in later years with the decorative aspect of both canvas and frame in his work. In his monochromatic colour scheme, he draws the viewers attention to the central figures, thereby simplifying the composition and doing away with other superfluous narrative detail. The highly sculptural forms of centaur's figures become the focus at the moment of the arrow's fatal impact.
Stuck's work was clearly a reaction to the confines of the Künstlergenossenschaft in Munich, who still defined artistic competence by means of stringent academic history painting. Stuck's originality and individuality as an artist, as this early work illustrates, became a benchmark for a new generation of artists at the turn of the century.