. The driving clubs of greater Boston . f Equine Portrait Painters Who Have Won Fame (By Everett L. "Percy" Smith) Permission of Trotter and Pacer OF our painters of horses in action, the late W. Scott Leighton, of Boston, was facile princeps. His landscape work toward the end was excellent, and he got atmos- phere into his skies. As a colorist he rivaled, it is my individual pleasure to con- sider, the great Meissonier. I saw him, back in the 70's, working on an action piece, its subject the snip-nosed Smuggler, 2:15 1-4, the champion trotting stallion from 1876 to '84, and, in a wa
. The driving clubs of greater Boston . f Equine Portrait Painters Who Have Won Fame (By Everett L. "Percy" Smith) Permission of Trotter and Pacer OF our painters of horses in action, the late W. Scott Leighton, of Boston, was facile princeps. His landscape work toward the end was excellent, and he got atmos- phere into his skies. As a colorist he rivaled, it is my individual pleasure to con- sider, the great Meissonier. I saw him, back in the 70's, working on an action piece, its subject the snip-nosed Smuggler, 2:15 1-4, the champion trotting stallion from 1876 to '84, and, in a way, was a pupil of his at his Century Building studio, corner of Washington and Winter Streets, Boston. He gave instruction gratis, and was my kindest instructor of all. Like- wise, he always claimed my assistance as critic of action effect, though in but one in- stance that I recall was I of actual assistance. That was while he was working on his big canvas, "Here They Come," for which he received $3,000, and derived much revenue from photogravure reproductions. These readily sold at $10. One forenoon he was' puzzled because none of several sketches for the central figure, Charlie Thorn on a break, satisfied. I recall taking a crayon and sheet of wrapping paper, and, by twisting the head one side, convinced him horses usually "break to one side," and that, directly behind the poll, a bend of their necks is necessary to give that half-plunging action just before they catch to their stride. He finished his figure that fore- noon, and, if I do say it, there's not a better horse "on a break" in oils. Later he pre- sented me a rapidly executed facsimile sketch, 8x10, of Thorn alone, and various other tributes, trifles to him, golden to me. In his "Three Veterans," to be seen in the corridor beyond the ladies' entrance at the Adams House, he shows therein his versa- tility, and the three dray horses there posed include a strawberry roan, the be
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Keywords: ., bookcentury1900, bookdecade1910, booksubjecthorses, bookyear1914
