A Splendid Young Stag before a Wattle Fence 1736

Curator: Standing before us is "A Splendid Young Stag before a Wattle Fence," a drawing created in 1736 by Johann Elias Ridinger. Editor: My first impression? A peaceful, almost melancholy stillness. The delicate pencil work gives it a feeling of faded memory, like looking at a scene from a very old story. Curator: Ridinger, a prominent German draughtsman and engraver, dedicated much of his artistic career to depicting animals, especially horses and hunting scenes. His work often reflects the hierarchical relationship between humans and the natural world. In this piece, the stag isn't actively hunted, yet it is framed, contained by that rustic wattle fence, perhaps alluding to nature tamed. Editor: Absolutely. The fence—it's interesting, isn't it? Not just a physical barrier, but a symbolic one. Makes you wonder, is the stag free or merely posing within the confines of someone else's design? There's this strange juxtaposition of wildness and imposed order. The details in its musculature compared to the airy, indistinct forest... it feels significant. Curator: Exactly! Consider the period—the Enlightenment’s emphasis on categorizing and controlling nature. The stag, though "splendid," embodies that very tension: admired, but ultimately marked and managed. The medium—drawing—lends itself perfectly to exploring ideas around classification and scientific observation of the natural world. Editor: I also can't help but think about the gaze. The stag isn't looking at us. He's looking... beyond, into a space we can't access. Makes me think about our human tendency to project stories onto animals, to read our own emotions into their silence. Curator: And within the wider social context of Ridinger’s patronage networks, these idealized animals also serve as reflections of status and privilege for the elite who commissioned and collected his work. These weren't simply sentimental renderings. They performed a specific social function. Editor: Makes you consider, doesn't it, how much of what we see is filtered through layers of power? Curator: Indeed. So much more than just a "splendid young stag." Editor: Yes, and so much more to question than initially meets the eye. It feels almost haunting, this peacefulness loaded with history.