Page 54 - The Hunt - Winter 2023/24

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THE HUNT MAGAZINE winter 2023-24
When Unionville artist J. Clayton Bright first started sculpting in the 1970s, he was spending the first five hours of his day working with horses. “As anyone who’s done the same can tell you, each horse, like every hound or person, is unique— both spiritually and physically,” he notes.
And so came the second piece—Juniper’s neck and head mounted on a pedestal with one small, solitary wing. “As my interests include quantum physics and relativity, I imagine this horse as a singularity—both
a particle and a wave until disturbed or awakened,” Levitina says. “It’s about living in, and being grateful for, a moment in time with neither attachment nor regret.”
Levitina isn’t the only sculptor with horses in the Somerville Manning exhibit. There
are several in different styles by other artists, all with some connection to the region. The subject matter is a universal one—especially in the Brandywine Valley, where there’s probably no animal more sculpted than the horse. For riders, the horse moving under them is like a fluid, living piece of sculpture come alive. Margery Torrey has had a love affair with horses for as long as she can remember. “I brought one home, and my mother let me keep it,” says Torrey, who grew
up on a farm on Long Island, New York,
and today rides to the hounds in Unionville. “Toby became my mentor—a cute bay from Amarillo, Texas, that had fallen on hard times, a rescue from a horse-rental stable.”
For an artist, there are many things that guide them in capturing a horse’s form and spirit. Cochranville’s Rikki Morley Saunders sculpts only from “real life.” For years, her muse was a horse named Volant. “Volant was extraordinary, the horse of a lifetime. We competed in the long format of three-day eventing in England and the United States.
At Rolex in Lexington, Kentucky, we came
in fifth, which landed us on the long list for the 1984 Olympic Games,” says Saunders, who’s represented at the Brandywine Museum of Art, among other venues. “Volant and
I went foxhunting after I retired him from competition. It was such a thrill to still go cross-country with this magnificent creature— so many fond memories. He lived to be 29.”