Equestrian Print - I

Reins loose and the hounds circling at the hooves, a huntsman sits his grey horse outside a cottage, a moment away from setting off. This is "Le Départ du Chasseur," the huntsman's departure, a hand-colored print after Carle Vernet, drawn by him and published in Paris by the printseller Bance in the early 1800s. Vernet was the great French painter of the horse and the hunt, and his sporting scenes were loved enough to be printed and reprinted for a century, this copy among the later ones, found in Le Mans and dating to the early 20th. Sylvie hangs it in a study or a stair hall, one of a pair of Vernet hunting scenes that look best hung together.