Lot Essay
In 1858, Arthur Fitzwilliam Tate (1819-1905) painted his first picture titled The Life of a Hunter: A Tight Fix. After being singled out for praise at the National Academy of design that Spring, the painting was purchased for $500 and was not seen again until 1967 when it was discovered at the Elks Lodge in Redlands, California. The painting is now in the collection of Richard Manoogian.
After initially being well-received, the painting stirred up controversy with the press and art critics who claimed that Tait did not acknowledge that he had assistance on the canvas and who also criticized the composition and design. Following all the publicity, Currier and Ives commissioned Tait to paint a second canvas of the same subject afterwhich this lithograph of 1861 was made. The second canvas was also exhibited at the National Academy of Design and its present whereabouts are unknown.
The lithographic stone which was used to produce Life of a Hunter. "A tight fix". was accidentally broken and no more than a dozen impressions of the print are known to have survived. The print quickly became one of the most valuable lithographs of the time and, as with the first Tait painting, attracted both interest and scrutiny. One of the more interesting criticisms came from a professor who claimed that Tait's composition was borrowed from an illustration in a biography of Daniel Boone. The same charge of plagarism has been made against the first canvas in 1858 when a critic claimed that Tait had taken his composition from the widely read Davy Crockett almanacs.
After initially being well-received, the painting stirred up controversy with the press and art critics who claimed that Tait did not acknowledge that he had assistance on the canvas and who also criticized the composition and design. Following all the publicity, Currier and Ives commissioned Tait to paint a second canvas of the same subject afterwhich this lithograph of 1861 was made. The second canvas was also exhibited at the National Academy of Design and its present whereabouts are unknown.
The lithographic stone which was used to produce Life of a Hunter. "A tight fix". was accidentally broken and no more than a dozen impressions of the print are known to have survived. The print quickly became one of the most valuable lithographs of the time and, as with the first Tait painting, attracted both interest and scrutiny. One of the more interesting criticisms came from a professor who claimed that Tait's composition was borrowed from an illustration in a biography of Daniel Boone. The same charge of plagarism has been made against the first canvas in 1858 when a critic claimed that Tait had taken his composition from the widely read Davy Crockett almanacs.