Arab Horses Fighting in a Stable

Arab Horses Fighting in a Stable (1860) by Eugène Delacroix

Arab Horses Fighting in a Stable is an 1860 Orientalist painting by the French Romantic artist Eugène Delacroix, now in the musée d'Orsay.^[1]

History

The artist assisted in a stallion-fight during his time in Morocco, which left a deep impression and was mentioned in a letter to his friends on 8 February 1832.^[2] He produced a sketch of it and noted that "the grey horse passed his head under the neck of the other [horse]".^[2] In his diary entry for 19 June 1854 Delacroix mentioned this subject as one of several Morocco-themed works he was then working on, but even so he only seems to have begun Arab Horses around two years later in 1856. He completed it on 14 June 1860,^[3] putting thirty years between the stallion-fight and the work's completion. The painting is signed and dated by the artist at the lower left. Delacroix has set action in a stable, although the event that inspired the painting had taken place outdoors.^[4]

He produced the work for Estienne, the same art dealer as Horses Leaving the Sea, and so the two works are usually considered as a pair.^[2]

The work was sold in Paris on 12 February 1872 and the following year John Saulnier acquired it in Bordeaux. It was next recorded as being owned by Charles Hayem in 1885, then by Isaac de Camondo.^[3] It was donated to the Louvre in 1908,^[5] exhibiting it two years later ^[6] It was moved to its present home in 1986.^[1]

References

1. "Catalogue entry".
2. (in French) Jean-Pierre Digard (ed.), Chevaux et cavaliers arabes dans les arts d'Orient et d'Occident, Éditions Gallimard et Institut du monde arabe, 27 novembre 2002, 304 p. (ISBN 2-07-011743-X), p 245
3. (in French) Delacroix, le voyage au Maroc : Exposition organisée par l'Institut du Monde Arabe du 27 septembre 1994 au 15 janvier 1995, Flammarion, 1994, 240 p. (ISBN 9782080124364), p 230
4. Allard, Sébastien; Fabre, Côme; Korchane, Mehdi (2018). Delacroix. New York, NY: Metropolitan Museum of Art. p. 213. ISBN 978-1-58839-651-8
5. Musée du Louvre, Centenaire d'Eugène Delacroix, 1798-1863: Musée du Louvre, mai-septembre 1963, Ministère d'État, Affaires culturelles, 1963, 172 p., p. 165.
6. Nathalia Brodskaya, Eugène Delacroix, Parkstone International, coll. « Perfect Square », 2011, 80 p. (ISBN 1781607168 and 9781781607169)