Foxes in Art

Since the cave paintings of many thousands of years ago, there have been animals depicted in art.  The same goes for Vulpes vujlpes, though not for quite that long.

Most art captures how the fox was viewed at that particular time in history.  As brought up before, foxes were often hunted for sport in different places in Europe for centuries, and have only recently been made illegal.  The act of the fox hunt was viewed as a nobleman activity, and had a large amount of art created for it, such as this example.

By Henry Thomas Alken
Early 1800's

While the fox was viewed as a hunting item in Europe, in Asia, particularly Japan, they were viewed as spirits, either capable of good or evil.  Foxes, or kitsunes, were known to be able to change into humans, normally females to trick humans.

By: Yoshitoshi
1886

In recent times, foxes have taken on many different roles in art, and can be seen everywhere in art, and in different forms.  These pieces featuring foxes can be done to look realistic, bringing the viewer closer to nature, they can be seen heavily anthropomorphized, and even talking in comics, or there are recreations of styles done in earlier times, like Japanese.
Here are a few examples, but look through the internet and you will see the immense multitude of modern art featuring foxes.

Paul Krapf


Steven Womack


SilentReaper @ Deviantart


Sources:
http://fineartamerica.com/featured/hunting-scene-henry-thomas-alken.html
http://www.theartofjapan.com/ArtDetail.asp?Inv=1006922
http://fineartamerica.com/featured/young-red-paul-krapf.html
http://society6.com/product/Fox_Print#1=45
http://silentreaper.deviantart.com/