Monarch of the Glen

The Monarch of the Glen is an oil-on-canvas painting of a red deer stag completed in 1851 by the English painter Sir Edwin Landseer. It was commissioned as part of a series of three panels to hang in the Palace of Westminster, in London. As one of the most popular paintings throughout the 19th century, it sold widely in reproductions in steel engraving, and was finally bought by companies to use in advertising. The painting had become something of a cliché by the mid-20th century, as "the ultimate biscuit tin image of Scotland: a bulky stag set against the violet hills and watery skies of an isolated wilderness", according to the Sunday Herald. The stag has twelve points on his antlers, which in deer terminology makes him a "royal stag" but not a "monarch stag", for which sixteen points are needed. In 2017 the National Galleries of Scotland in Edinburgh launched a successful campaign to buy the painting for £4 million, finally achieving the acquisition. The painting is now part of the collection, and is on display at the Scottish National Gallery in Room 12. History Landseer was a member of the Royal Academy, a favourite of Queen Victoria, and had become famous for his paintings and drawings of animals. His later works include the sculptures of the lions at the foot of Nelson's Column in Trafalgar Square. From the 1840s, he produced a series of intricately observed studies of stags based on those he had seen on the trips he had been making to the Scottish Highlands since 1824. In 1850, Landseer received a national commission to paint three subjects connected with the chase for the Refreshment Rooms of the House of Lords, for which he produced Monarch of the Glen and two other paintings. Once they were completed the House of Commons refused to grant the £150 promised for the commission, and, as a result, the paintings were sold to private collectors. It has been claimed that the landscape setting shows Glen Affric.It was exhibited in London in 1851, 1874 and 1890. From the collection of William Denison, 1st Earl of Londesborough it passed in 1884 to Henry Eaton, 1st Baron Cheylesmore after whose death in 1891 it realized £7,245 at his sale at Christie's in May 1892, where it was bought by Agnew's, who resold it to T. Barratt for £8,000. In 1916 he resold it at Christie's for £5,250.