There’s no shortage of opportunities for horse watching in the southern Adirondacks, especially with Saratoga Race Course’s 2018 meet kicking off Friday, July 20. But just in case anyone was seeking a different, more interpretative perspective, curators at The Hyde Collection have you covered.
The show is called “Horse and Rider,” and it’s aimed to amplify the already heady equine mood overtaking the region. The show also opens on July 20th in the Rotunda Gallery and will stay up through Sept. 9.
The Horse and Rider show explores the relationship between man and horse in the contexts of sport, pleasure, and work, according to Hyde Collection officials.
“The racing season in Saratoga is a wonderful opportunity for us to exhibit some extraordinary works from our permanent collection,” Jonathan Canning, director of curatorial affairs and programming, said in a release. “Having such a wide variety of horse-inspired artwork demonstrates the importance man has long placed on our relationship with the animals.”
The exhibition is comprised of ten works from the permanent collection by artists such as Edgar Degas, Frederick Remington, Henri Cartier-Bresson, Anna Hyatt Huntington, Wilke, James Brooks, and Danny Lyon.
Highlights include Degas’ Four Studies of a Jockey for “Racehorses before the Stands” which are heliotypes of the artist’s works made with his approval, and his Horse at Trough, a figure that was cast in bronze from a wax model after Degas’ death in 1917.
The exhibit will also feature two photographs from Danny Lyon’s groundbreaking Conversations with the Dead series from his photographs of southern prisons in the 1960s.
The show will also highlight Henri Cartier-Bresson’s photographs of Robert F. Kennedy and his wife and son in stables, Hyannisport, Massachusetts, and RFK on horseback with his family — particularly relevant given the 50th anniversary of Kennedy’s assassination.
Rounding out the exhibition are watercolors, oil paintings, and sculptures, just some of the nearly 4,000 works of art that are a permanent part of The Hyde Collection.
