Survival of the Fittest: Envisioning Wildlife and Wilderness with the Big Four, Masterworks from the Rijksmuseum Twenthe and the National Museum of Wildlife Art

Survival of the Fittest: Envisioning Wildlife and Wilderness with the Big Four, Masterworks from the Rijksmuseum Twenthe and the National Museum of Wildlife Art

“The work of these four artists established a vision of wildlife and wilderness that remains with us today and had a tremendous influence on wildlife artists of the 20th century.”

– Curator Dr. Adam Duncan Harris

Survival of the Fittest: Envisioning Wildlife and Wilderness with the Big Four, Masterworks from the Rijksmuseum Twenthe and the National Museum of Wildlife Art is now on exhibit at the National Sporting Museum in Middleburg. It is the first major piece of scholarship to come out of the multiyear Carl Rungius Catalogue Raisonné project. Presented with an accompanying catalogue, it features approximately 50 masterworks created by an influential group of painters known today as the Big Four: American Carl Rungius (born in Germany, 1869–1959), Germans Richard Friese (1854–1918) and Wilhelm Kuhnert (1865–1926), and Swede Bruno Liljefors (1860–1939).

The exhibit is open in the museum until Jan. 14, 2024 at 102 The Plains Road, Middleburg, VA 20117. More: info@nationalsporting.org.

Richard Friese (Germany, 1854 – 1918), Polar Bear and Eiders on the Coast, n.d. Oil on canvas. 25 x 38 inches. Collection of the Rijksmuseum Twenthe, Enschede, Netherlands.

Wilhelm Kuhnert (Germany, 1865 – 1926), Elephants, c. 1917. Oil on canvas. 48 x 86 inches. JKM Collection®, National Museum of Wildlife Art.

Richard Friese (Germany, 1854 – 1918), Tiger with Blackbuck, 1889. Oil on canvas. 30 1/3 x 38 1/6 inches. Collection of the Rijksmuseum Twenthe, Enschede, Netherlands. Photograph by Rik Klein Gotink.

Bruno Liljefors (Sweden, 1860 – 1939), Migrating Mute Swans, 1925. Oil on canvas. 41 ½ × 62 inches. Collection of the Rijksmuseum Twenthe, Enschede, Netherlands. Photograph by Rik Klein Gotink.