George Stubbs, A.R.A.

Probably commissioned by Major Campbell Morris (1771–1817), 6^th Inniskilling Dragoons, of Loddington Hall, Leicestershire;

Thence likely by descent in the house until 1877;

Probably acquired with the house by Sholto Douglas, Lord Aberdour, later 19^th Earl of Morton (1844–1935);

Probably acquired, together with the house, by George Jackson, 3^rd Baron Allerton (1903–1991);

With Frank Partridge Inc., New York;

By whom sold, London, Sotheby's, 29 June 1960, lot 114, to Drown for £500;

Raoul Millais (1901–1999), Westcote Manor, Gloucestershire;

By whom sold, London, Christie's, 17 June 1966, lot 94, to Llewellyn, for 4800 guineas;

Sir Rhys Llewellyn, Bt (1910–1978);

Anonymous sale, London, Christie's, 22 March 1974, lot 170 for 2800 guineas;

Where acquired by the present owner.

J. Egerton, George Stubbs, Painter. Catalogue Raisonné, New Haven and London 2007, p. 626, no. 338, reproduced.

Judy Egerton has dated this picture to circa 1802–4 at the end of the artist's long career when he was almost eighty years old. Many artists of this period would have contemplated retirement but Stubbs continued to work at a furious pace, undertaking works which were ambitious in their scale and concept. However, it is clear that Stubbs also enjoyed painting domestic subjects such as favourite dogs and aged hunters, perhaps regarding them as a welcome relief after the great racehorses and wide ranging wild animals for which he was so famous. One such example is this sympathetic study of a favourite grey cob whose name, Rainbow, suggests a peaceful temperament.

Rainbow was a cob, an animal which was larger than a pony but smaller than a horse. Not considered to be a separate breed, cobs are generally sturdy with short legs and are prized for their easy going personalities. They were therefore considered suitable for pulling carts and were ideal for elderly riders.

Stubbs had an astonishing stamina for a man of his age. Humphry records that on 31 August 1803, just after he had reached 79, Stubbs told him that having missed the coach he ‘walked two or three times from his own House to the Earl of Clarendon's... a distance of Sixteen miles carrying with him a little Trunk in his Hand’. In his seminal work on the artist Basil Taylor records that at 75 Stubbs would reach Watford on foot by 10 am and that from Somerset Street the day before his death he walked nine miles. Few artists had such an Indian summer. At the age of almost 70 he embarked on the ill-fated Review of the Turf which would have involved the painting of 145 pictures, and at 76 he had painted Hambletonian, one of his largest and greatest works as well as a group of pictures for the Earl of Clarendon. When he died aged 82 he was still working on the ambitious Comparative Anatomy for which he had executed 125 drawings. Yet he still had the energy and determination to fulfil less prestigious commissions, evidence of his enduring fascination with the animal kingdom.

When the picture of Rainbow was first offered for sale at auction in 1960 it was stated to have come from Loddington Hall in Leicestershire. The naturalistic landscape background in the painting, so characteristic of Stubbs work, closely resembles the park at Loddington, even today, and it seems likely that the painting was painted on site there. Loddington Hall is a late seventeenth-century house, bought in 1670 by John Morris and owned by his descendants for almost two hundred years. At the turn of the 19^th Century, it was the home of Major Campbell Morris, an officer in the 6^th Inniskilling Dragoons, and his wife Mary-Anne Allen, who probably owned the horse and commissioned Stubbs to paint this picture. Major Morris had eight children, four sons and four daughters, the eldest of whom, Charles Campbell Morris (c.1800–1850), inherited Loddington after his father’s death. The house remained in the Morris family until 1877 when it was acquired as a hunting lodge by Sholto Douglas, Lord Aberdour, later 19^th Earl of Morton (1844–1935). Following his death in 1935, Loddington was acquired by George Jackson, 3^rd Baron Allerton (1903–1991) and it is likely that the picture remained with the property throughout these changes of ownership, later being disposed of following the War when the house was requisitioned and the family moved out. Its recent provenance is also of interest. Having appeared at auction in 1960, the picture was owned by Raoul Millais, grandson of the celebrated Pre-Raphaelite and himself a notable and prolific equestrian artist and sportsman. Millais lived at Westcote Manor, near Stow-on-the-Wold, where this painting would have hung, and, as well as painting other animal and sporting subjects, he continued in the tradition begun by Stubbs of producing portraits of the great, celebrated racehorses of his day – among them the classic winners Big Game and Sun Chariot, for King George VI. In 1966 he sold this painting at auction, when it was bought by Sir Rhys Llewelyn, a keen hunting man, whose brother Harry was a great show jumper and Olympic medallist.