Studies of Standing Bulls

Rosa Bonheur's Studies of Standing Bulls from 1866 belongs to the long tradition of preparatory animal studies that she kept alongside her finished exhibition pieces. Throughout her career Bonheur maintained the practice — drilled into her by her father and by her own early commitment to zoological accuracy — of sketching and painting animals repeatedly from life before incorporating them into larger compositions. Her studio at By was surrounded by paddocks and a menagerie expressly to enable this constant study. The bull was one of her signature subjects, made famous by her 1848 Ploughing in the Nivernais and by The Horse Fair's adjacent presence of large draught animals, and she returned to bovine anatomy throughout her career. A painting designated as studies retains this observational directness — the emphasis is less on finished surface than on capturing weight, mass, and the particular way a bull distributes its bulk across its legs. In 1866 Bonheur was firmly established at By and painting with great confidence.

The study format allowed Bonheur to work with energetic directness, building bovine mass through broad tonal blocking rather than refined surface finish. Multiple viewpoints or poses within a single canvas were common in her study works. Warm brown and ochre predominate, with precise attention to the hooves and muzzle.