GEORGE STUBBS
British equine and society portrait painter,
naturalist, and anatomist. Stubbs was one of
the first European artists to make an accurate
representation of the rhinoceros. His painted
portrait of the beast is in the Royal College of
Surgeons of England, London. Stubbs's most
celebrated publication, Anatomy of the Horse,
comprises 18 plates showing dissections in
layers from bone through musculature to skin,
in three views—rear front, and side.
Dissections Stubbs took his knife and his pencil and physically
climbed inside the horse, dissecting and drawing until he
understood the mechanisms of its power and grace. Dissections
were made over a total of 18 months. The entire project was
developed over ten years. This is one of Stubbs' original finished
pencil drawings, composed from notes and observations. He
translated his own drawings into engravings for publication.
Lighting Stubbs's breathtaking work won immediate
international acclaim, which has never diminished. There
is no other work like it. He composed each plate from his
knowledge of parts, and therefore invented the lighting that
makes each horse appear so real and three-dimensional.
Compare how Stubbs and Durer both invented lighting to
portray the reality of their animals.
Table III of the Skeleton
of the Horse (rear view)
1756-58
14x7 in (354 x 180 mm)
GEORGE STUBBS