Henry Stull

Considered the most eminent painter of racehorses in 19^th century America alongside Edward Troye, Henry Stull’s exposure to horses came at a very early age thanks to his coachman father. When Stull went to New York in 1873 in the hope of becoming an actor, and finding no success in the new career, the young man consoled himself at the racetracks where he would draw horses. Stull submitted a portfolio of sketches to Frank Leslie, editor of Leslie’s Weekly, who immediately hired him to do caricatures and cartoons. While attending a race at the Jerome Park Racetrack in the Bronx, Stull sketched “Fiddlesticks”, owner by financier August Belmont Jr., founder of the Belmont Stakes. Impressed by the drawing of his horse, Belmont used his influence to get Stull a job as an illustrator with the horse and sporting magazine Spirit of the Times which caught the eye of Harper’s Weekly with whom Stull first published in 1883.

In order to prefect his paintings, Stull studied horse anatomy at a veterinarian college. His flattering and increasingly accurate portraits attracted the attention the wealthiest and most powerful horse breeders including film director William Whitney, tobacco magnate Pierre Lorillard, financier Leonard Jerome and Samuel D. Riddle, owner of Man O’ War, regarded as the greatest racehorse of all time (see lot 403).

Stull would sketch the horses at the races or their natural settings in Kentucky and transpose them onto canvas in his studio.

Of the approximately 110 paintings that have survived, most were owned by both the New York and Brooklyn Jockey Clubs. Stull’s paintings can be admired at the Kentucky Derby Museum and National Museum of Racing Hall of Fame.