306 Caribou

Category Western Americana
Auction Currency USD
Start Price NA
Estimated at 15,000.00 - 25,000.00 USD
Caribou
Artist: Hays, William JacobDate of Birth: 1830-1875
Medium: Oil on canvas
Dimensions: 26 x 48 inches
Signed: Signed lower right and dated 1871

Considering himself as much a naturalist as an artist, William Jacob Hays often ventured far from his home in New York City to travel in search of flora and fauna to draw and paint. Perhaps his most important trip was one he took via steamboat from St. Louis to Yellowstone up the Missouri River in 1860. Hays is notable for his fidelity to nature and his interest in diversity within a single species, as witnessed in Caribou, a very fine 1871 canvas, done after the artistÕs journey to Nova Scotia and the other Maritime Provinces of Canada. In Caribou, Hays includes young and old males and femalesÑsome nearly white, others shading to dark brown. The naturalness of their poses and the randomness of their positions relative to one another anticipates the great animal painters of the late 19th and 20th centuries.