Dead Tiger
19th century
Antoine-Louis Barye, the master of animal sculpture, captured the raw power of nature even in his quietest sketches. This delicate drawing shows a tiger lying flat, its body stretched out in a pose of final rest. Barye was famous for his dramatic bronze sculptures of animals fighting, but here we see a rare moment of stillness. He spent hours at the Paris zoo studying animal anatomy, sometimes even dissecting them to get every muscle right! This sketch likely served as a study for one of his many wild creations.
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