A Goose and a Gander with their Goslings Honking in Alarm as Two Foxes with their Cubs Emerge from the Rushes
Johann Heinrich Wilhelm Tischbein German
Not on view
Impending violence contrasts with a lushly serene natural setting in this highly finished drawing of foxes threatening a family of geese. The image derives either from "Gänsegeschichten" (The Legend of the Geese), a fable the artist wrote around 1803, or from Goethe's more famous "Reineke Fuchs." Intended as a satirical commentary upon human folly, the work demonstrates how the close literary friendship established between Tischbein and Goethe in Italy continued after both had returned to Germany.