Deer and Deer Hounds in a Mountain Torrent (‘The Hunted Stag’)
- Artist: Sir Edwin Henry Landseer
- Date: ?1832, exhibited 1833
- Medium: Oil paint on canvas on mahogany
- Dimensions: support: 405 x 908 mm
- Museum: Tate Britain
- Collection record: Tate Britain website
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About this artwork
This is the “Deer and Deer Hounds in a Mountain Torrent (The Hunted Stag)” by Sir Edwin Henry Landseer. Landseer spent many summers in the Scottish Highlands, and that rugged landscape runs through the heart of this painting. A lone stag, wounded and dying, thunders through a raging torrent, its antlers lashing against the water, while a line of staghounds pursues. The scene is charged with raw courage—an animal’s last stand against both predator and nature’s fury.
The dramatic light and shadow across the rocky gorge heighten the sense of awe and foreboding, while the waterfall’s roar is almost audible. Landseer’s mastery of animal emotion is on full display; the stag’s defiant struggle feels almost human. In a time when the Highlands were suffering from the Highland Clearances, this work offered a romantic, almost mythic vision of Scotland’s wild beauty, deliberately pulling viewers away from the grim realities of that era.
Painted in 1832 and shown the following year, the oil on canvas mounted on mahogany captures a fleeting, intense moment in the Highlands, reminding us of nature’s power and the indomitable spirit of its creatures.
See it in person
Deer and Deer Hounds in a Mountain Torrent (‘The Hunted Stag’) is in the collection of Tate Britain on Millbank, London — free to enter. Point your phone at any artwork there and audioguide.london plays a free audio guide in six languages — no app download needed.
