Nubian Giraffe Jacques-Laurent Agasse 1827

Nubian Giraffe
Jacques-Laurent Agasse 1827
From the collection of
Royal Collection Trust, UK
This famous giraffe calf was sent by Mehemet Ali, Pasha of Egypt, to George IV; it arrived in England in August 1927 and was installed at George IV's menagerie in Windsor but died two years later. In 1827 Agasse painted the entire entourage surround this exotic animal: two Egyptian cows who acted as wet-nurses; two Arab keepers and the menagerie owner, Edward Cross (1773 - 1854), who supervised the giraffe's brief time in Windsor. This is the portrait of a noble animal's captivity, with solicitous keepers trying to persuade him to drink or perhaps examining his urine. The fact that his immense neck is bent is not an accident but a symbol of his condition. The perfect profile of the view remind us that Agasse trained with the Neo-classical painter Jacques-Louis David.
Details
Title: Nubian Giraffe
Creator: Jacques-Laurent Agasse
Date Created: 1827
Provenance: Commissioned by George IV
Object description: The Nubian giraffe is standing in a paddock, being fed by two Arab keepers who are holding up a bowl. With them is Edward Cross. Behind to the right a shed, and to left lying down two Egyptian cows. Beyond the fence a wood.
Type: Painting
Rights: Supplied by Royal Collection Trust / (c) HM Queen Elizabeth II 2012
External Link: http://www.royalcollection.org.uk/collection/404394

Royal Collection Trust, UK
London, United Kingdom

The Royal Collection is one of the largest and most important art collections in the world, and one of the last great European royal collections to remain intact.

Comprising almost all aspects of the fine and decorative arts and running to more than a million objects, it is held in trust by The Queen as Sovereign for her successors and the nation. The Royal Collection is a unique and valuable record of the personal tastes of kings and queens over hundreds of years.

Following the execution of Charles I in 1649, the greater part of the King's magnificent possessions was sold by order of Oliver Cromwell, and the Royal Collection has largely been formed since the Restoration of the Monarchy in 1660.

The most important additions to the Royal Collection were made by Frederick, Prince of Wales, George III, George IV, Queen Victoria and Prince Albert, and Queen Mary, consort of King George V.

The Royal Collection includes the majority of the contents of some 13
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Jacques-Laurent Agasse
Apr 24, 1767 - Dec 27, 1849

Jacques-Laurent Agasse was an animal and landscape painter from Switzerland.
Born at Geneva, Agasse studied in the public art school of that city. Before he turned twenty he went to Paris to study in veterinary school to make himself fully acquainted with the anatomy of horses and other animals. He seems to have subsequently returned to Switzerland. The Tübinger Morgenblatt says that "Agasse, the celebrated animal painter, now in England, owed his fortune to an accident. About eight years ago, he being then in Switzerland, a rich Englishman asked him to paint his favourite dog which had died. The Englishman was so pleased with his work that he took the painter to England with him."
Nagler says that he was one of the most celebrated animal painters at the end of the 18th and the beginning of the 19th century. In Meusel's Neue Miscellaneen, he compares Agasse and Wouvermans, wholly in favour of the former. In that partial article much is said of his extreme devotion to art, of his marvelous knowledge of anatomy, of his special fondness for the English racehorses, and his excellence in depicting them.
http://hisour.com/art-medium/paintings/nubian-giraffe-jacques-laurent-agasse-1827/