Decorating our homes involves very personal choices.
Animal Canvas Art has always been revered by collectors: And today, while we
have great variety on offer it remains popular. It seems somewhat of an
instinctive choice: After all, since human beings were little more than cave
dwellers we have decorated our environment with images of the animals
inhabiting their environment. Indeed, our love of animal oil paintings is
universal and outside of cultural distinction.
Within Western art one of the most favorite subjects
of collectors and artists alike is the Horse: An animal highly revered by the
majority. Classical Equestrian oil paintings as well as modern interpretations
are readily available giving buyers’ more choices than ever before. Modern
interpretations are extremely in vogue. Even so, the more classical Equestrian oil
paintings always
seem to be in favor.
George Stubbs is one of the best known classical
creators of Equestrian oil paintings in the world: And indeed he did have an acute
sensibility to this majestic and mighty animal – This is clearly evident within
the oil on canvas art works he produced. This incredible draughtsman received
little formal tuition: His studies and interests were born from his
environment. Stubbs was born in the city of Liverpool in 1724. His father was a
currier of horse hides: That is a specialist craftsman who dresses, finishes
and colors a hide after tanning.
The young Stubbs was exposed to and so began studying
the muscles and bone structure of the slaughtered animals at his father’s
Tannery. While his studies were not formal: The specific study pf anatomy is
something classical artists apt to do. Indeed, Michelangelo and Leonardo da
Vinci (as well as a long list of other famous artists) explored this route of visual
learning. In this way an artist can truly understand how the body moves: Therefore
interpret the subject more accurately and naturally.
Indeed, this was what made the oil paintings of George
Stubbs unique. His incredible ability to capture the equine anatomy was not
only down to possessing great skill; he also possessed great knowledge of his
subject. Stubbs’ book of etchings – The
Anatomy of The Horse – was first published in 1766. It took eighteen months
to complete and this book remains in print even today. An engraver in York
taught Stubbs how to create etchings after he went there to study human anatomy
at the York Medical Centre in 1744.
In 1759 George Stubbs relocated to London with his wife and son. Here, his
Equestrian
oil paintings became famous among the city’s aristocrats: And so he was commissioned
to paint some of the most famous horses of that period. Whistlejacket created
in 1762 is almost certainly the artists’ most famous Equestrian oil painting. The
second Marquis of Rockingham owned the champion racehorse known as
Whistlejacket: He was a regular patron of Stubbs.
The oil painting Whistlejacket
is large scale – approximately ten feet high. Today this incredible oil on
canvas art work is permanently exhibited at the National Gallery in London’s
Trafalgar Square. This oil painting has no background at all. Stubbs is
renowned for painting the horse first and the background afterwards: For him
this was an incidental of secondary (at most) importance. Indeed, many critics
feel his greatest Equestrian oil paintings are those without a background.
George Stubbs expanded his canvas
art work genre to include wild animals around the 1770’s. During this period Stubbs
experimented with enamel paints and was commissioned to paint a variety of wild
animals. Two years after producing Anatomy
of The Horse he began work on another of his most famous and greatest oil
paintings: Horse Attacked by a Lion: This oil painting took
four years to create and so was not completed until 1972. In 1780 George Stubbs
was received by members into London’s Royal Academy of Arts: One year later he
became a full member of this important body. The Academy believed oils to be
the correct medium for painting. Hence, Stubbs would revert back to producing
oil on canvas art works once more.
Toward the end of his life the
artist preferred to create scenes of rural life: His reputation as one of the
most skilled Equine painters of the era ebbed away with time. George Stubbs
died in 1806 at the age of 82 on the brink of financial ruin.
