Combat Between the Giaour and the Pasha

Single combat, which is its own cavalry subject

The cavalry pictures in this register mostly fall into two kinds: the charge, where a mass of animals delivers force in one direction, and the melee, where a field of riders is tangled together. A duel between two named opponents is a third. It reduces the whole apparatus to a pair, and in doing so it makes the horses legible as individual actors rather than as collective momentum — two animals turning against each other at close range while their riders do the fighting. The title of this work names both opponents, which is what fixes it in that third category.

What the record holds

The date of creation is 1826 and the location is the Art Institute of Chicago. No dimensions are recorded for this work; the field is empty and this entry leaves it so. Orientalism is the recorded style and French the nationality attached to the painter. Alongside Animal Art and Animal Art > Horse the record carries cultural heritage and mythology headings, and the measured colour families of the image are brown and yellow.

Reading this painter across the register

Fifteen of his works are catalogued here, and they concentrate on hunts, single combats and animals under attack rather than on formal battle. That is a description of what this catalogue happens to hold, not a summary of a career, and this register keeps the distinction visible.