Acknowledgements: © State Library of New South Wales; Equinity in the Picture Gallery; Free Exhibition from 8 October 2007 to 13 January 2008.

Featured Image: ‘Flying Buck’: The winner of the first Australian Champion Sweepstakes, October 1st 1859; De Gruchy and Leigh after Frederick Woodhouse Senior. The horse was usually presented in full-length side-view with head in profile, sometimes including informative props or background. The jockey is mounted at a racecourse with groom or owner in attendance.

See also: https://sconevetdynasty.com.au/equinity-portrait/

During the early nineteenth century, Arab horses and thoroughbreds were brought to the colony in significant numbers for breeding and sports such as racing, steeplechasing and hunting. There was a sharp increase in thoroughbred arrivals from the 1830s when these pursuits were well established.

This increase in blood or pedigree horse ownership generated a significant market for professionally painted equine portraits by English specialists such as Edward Winstanley, Joseph Fowles and Frederick Woodhouse Senior. All arrived in the colony between 1833 and 1858. One British artist Ben Marshall claimed he went to Newmarket because “A man will pay me fifty guineas for painting his horse, who thinks ten guineas too much for painting his wife”.

George Stubbs was particularly influential in developing the British approach to equine portraiture and documenting the emerging English breed, the thoroughbred, during the second half of the eighteenth century. The portrait of Flying Buck, based on a work by Frederick Woodhouse Senior comfortably fits within the genre’s parameters.

Acknowledgements: © State Library of New South Wales; Equinity in the Picture Gallery; Free Exhibition from 8 October 2007 to 13 January 2008.

Featured Image: A Race Meeting at Petersham c. 1845 W Scott

Sporting artists also developed a style of treatment for a group of horse galloping called the ‘rocking horse’ or ‘hobbyhorse’ gait, with front and back legs fully extended. W Scott’s depiction of A race meeting at Petersham is a good example of this treatment. This work also shows the common practice of flattening and elongating the horse to suggest speed, while stretching the head and neck to emphasise effort.

Acknowledgements: © State Library of New South Wales; Equinity in the Picture Gallery; Free Exhibition from 8 October 2007 to 13 January 2008.

Featured Images:

The brook, Five-Dock Grand Steeple-chase, c. 1844 Thomas Balcombe after Edward Winstanley

The stone wall, Five-Dock Grand Steeple-chase, c. 1844 Thomas Balcombe after Edward Winstanley

The first recorded steeplechase event in the colony was staged over 5 miles (8 km) between the Sydney suburbs of Botany and Coogee in 1832. The popularity of this sport saw a series of three annual steeplechase events being held in the 1840s, the Hawkesbury Stakes. Thus race was held over a three-mile (4.8 km) course at Mr Charles Abercrombie’s estate, located at present-day Birkenhead Point. Scenes from the first race are seen in Five-Dock grand steeple-chase, 1844.

The scenes depicted in Five-Dock grand steeple-chase reflect changes stages usually included in British works of similar race events, including the start or first leap, floundering in the brook, clearing a fence or wall, and the finish.