On loan to The Met The Met accepts temporary loans of art both for short-term exhibitions and for long-term display in its galleries.
Sketch for The Portage Sleigh on a Lumber Road
Frederic Remington American
Not on view
Remington often relied on quick on-site pencil impressions as the first step in his creative march to a published illustration. This drawing shows a sleigh laden with travelers and supplies for a moose-hunting trip in the Canadian North Woods. A more developed illustration followed (unlocated) and served as the basis for the wood engraving published in Harper’s Monthly in October 1890. The original sketch is tame in comparison to the final result, in which the sled careens downhill. The latter appears truer to Remington’s description (as recounted by his journalist friend Julian Ralph) of the snowy, rock- and stump-strewn paths as "the roughest travelling he had ever experienced."