Hunters and hounds; predators and prey. In Albrecht Christoph Wilhelm von Diez’s Hunters and Hounds, which can be read right to left, stormy skies become clear and tangled mounds of earth and plants transform into open fields. Participating in this drama are a couple on horseback, bounding across the landscape, while a pack of hounds, whose bodies imitate the gnarled branches of the shrubbery around them, run behind the riders. Instead of merely depicting a wealthy couple riding through an idyllic landscape, Diez has created a place where the plants, animals, and humans are all either hunting or being hunted.

Diez studied briefly in 1855 at the Royal Art Academy in Munich with painter and director Wilhelm Kaulbach. After fifteen years of independent work, Diez accepted an instructor position at the Academy, where he taught students a diverse array of painting techniques and styles: both traditional draftsmanship as well as progressive approaches, such as Impressionism and Jugendstil (an artistic movement related to Art Nouveau). Many of Diez’s students became successful painters, including Hugo von Habermann, Max Slevogt, and Otto Hierl-Deronco.

Hunters and Hounds is included in the exhibition Bringing Munich Home: Selections from the Frye Founding Collection (May 2, 2009–January 10, 2010).