Truss, A Hunter

Truss, A Hunter from around 1770 by George Stubbs is a named horse portrait documenting a specific hunting horse. The hunter was valued for its combination of speed, stamina, and jumping ability necessary for the demanding sport of riding to hounds. Stubbs's oil technique was grounded in exhaustive anatomical study—he spent eighteen months dissecting horses at a Lincolnshire farmhouse before painting the plates for his Anatomy of the Horse (1766)—producing an exactitude of musculature and...

The hunter is rendered with Stubbs's anatomical precision, the horse's conformation reflecting the athletic demands of the hunting field.