Suspense

Landseer's Suspense depicts an animal — most likely a dog — in a state of anxious expectation or watchful waiting, the specific quality of animal alertness rendered with psychological precision. The theme of suspense — the moment between stimulus and response, the animal caught in a state of heightened attention — was one Landseer returned to throughout his career, drawn to the psychological quality of animals in states of heightened awareness. His ability to render the muscular and postural expression of animal emotional states — the held breath, the pricked ears, the focused attention — with such convincing specificity gave his suspense subjects a psychological depth that his critics found equivalent to human emotional portraiture.

The bloodhound's drooping features and anxious eyes are rendered with remarkable psychological insight. The dog's massive form fills the foreground, and the closed door creates compositional tension. Landseer's handling of the hound's loose, wrinkled skin is a tour de force of animal painting.