How does The Horse Fair elucidate its Background?
Bonheur painted 'The Horse Fair' from a series of sketches of Percherons, and other draft horses, which she had made at the Paris horse market on the tree-lined Boulevard de l'Hôpital, near the Pitié-Salpêtrière Hospital, which is visible in the background to the painting.  She attended the market twice weekly for a year and a half from summer of 1850 to the end of 1851.  She sought a permission de travestissement from the Paris police to dress as a man, to avoid drawing attention to herself. She had earlier studied at a Paris slaughterhouse in 1845, a typical activity for an animal painter that she was the first woman to engage in, and had experienced harassment as a visible woman.In addition to studies at the Paris horse market, she also  modeled her animals on those from the Paris Omnibus Company.  She broke from tradition in depicting the horse eye as it is, rather than using anthropomorphism for emotional effect. It has been suggested that one of the human figures is a self-portrait.
Bonheur routinely wore masculine clothes at home and in the country. The Horse Fair is printed as Plate 18 in Germaine Greer's book The Obstacle Race, in which she writes: "There was nothing titillating about the full trousers and painters' smocks that Bonheur wore", and quotes the artist herself as saying:"I am a painter. I have earned my living honestly. My private life is nobody's concern."Among the influences on Bonheur's work are the painters George Stubbs, Théodore Géricault, and Eugène Delacroix, and sculpture from Ancient Greece.  She described the painting as her own Parthenon Frieze.  It is signed and dated, "Rosa Bonheur 1853.5".
draft horse in Paris horse market Germaine Greer Ancient Greece Salpêtrière Paris police x horse eye George Stubbs Rosa Bonheur Paris Omnibus Company Théodore Géricault Boulevard de l'Hôpital anthropomorphism Paris animal painter Parthenon Frieze Percheron slaughterhouse Pitié-Salpêtrière Hospital Eugène Delacroix 50