Sketch for The Death of the Red Deer

Building on the narrative and pictorial potential of local custom first explored by artists such as Sandby and Allan, Wilkie would gain European fame as a painter of genre scenes. This oil sketch is one of several Highland scenes inspired by his three-month tour of the Highlands in 1817. Set in Glen Tilt on the Atholl estate, it recalls a hunt Wilkie witnessed when visiting the 4th Duke and anticipates the mania for Highland deer hunting, immortalised by Queen Victoria’s favourite artist Sir Edwin Landseer, that reached its peak in the mid-19th century.