Young Horse

The son of a horse-trainer, Basil Blackshaw grew up surrounded by dogs and horses and he went on to work with these animals both as a trainer and a painter. Mike Catto, Senior Lecturer at the University of Ulster, wrote in 1985, 'To succeed in the long and honourable tradition of horse painting - from Stubbs, through Degas and up to the present day - for example, the painter not only has to be good: he needs to know and to understand horses and the horsey world ... In Basil Blackshaw's images of these creatures the spectator can see and share the artist's knowledge of the animals and of the act of painting' (see B. Ferran (intro.), Basil Blackshaw: Painter, Arts Council of Northern Ireland Exhibition Catalogue, Belfast, 1995, p. 50).