Drawing and Painting Horses
Eva Dutton

Search Press
8 February 2012 (US 1 June 2012) /ISBN-13: 9781844485437
How-To Books/Painting
Amazon US - UK

Reviewed by Rachel A Hyde

Horses have been popular subjects for artists for a very long time; one of the earliest pieces of artwork in Britain is a horse scratched onto a piece of bone! Here is a book devoted to the subject for all budding Stubbs.

This book features painting in watercolors and gouache, but the skills learned ought to translate well to any chosen medium -- possibly even making your own piece of latterday scrimshaw on a bone of your choice as there is plenty about drawing, not only as a preliminary to painting but in its own right.

There are lessons in here about getting under the skin of a horse and discovering how they move and what they look like in different positions. Poseable wooden figures of horses are expensive, so why not make your own out of pipe cleaners, a wonderful idea. Many sketches show how a drawing is built up out of ovals, and there are some excellent series of simple drawings showing what a horse looks like at the various stages of a walk, trot, canter and gallop.

All these tips are handsomely illustrated, and I found them easy to follow-- a series of mini lessons and ideas to try out which add up to progress at drawing a tricky animal. There are five projects in here to test out your skills, complete with what you need to buy and lots of illustrated stages. If you want to get to grips with painting horses this large format hardcover book is an excellent purchase.