August Friedrich Schenk

August Friedrich Schenck built his reputation in Paris by painting animals, especially sheep, as subjects capable of carrying human emotion. He moved to Paris as a young man to study at the École des Beaux-Arts and spent most of his career there. The National Gallery of Victoria notes that his animal scenes were often read as metaphors for human relationships and society. Several place sheep in severe winter landscapes, where survival itself becomes the subject. His best-known painting, Anguish, was made in 1878 and shows a ewe standing over the body of her lamb in the snow. The gallery bought the painting in 1880.