Francis Barlow

Francis Barlow was born in 1626 and is known as an English painter, etcher and illustrator. He must have been very prolific, as he left behind a widely diversified body of work. Barlow was one of the first painters to create atmospheric portraits of animals, e.g. dogs, oxen, the badger, mares with their foals, scenes of a farm with chickens and turkeys. Contemporaries praised his accuracy and the masterly depictions of the various animal species. For this he certainly had to make many sketches in the open air, in the countryside and in the woods, or to deal with representations of earlier masters. He also became famous for his detailed pictures, with which he captured turbulent hunting scenes and thrilling horse races. This is why his contemporaries affectionately called him the "father of sports painting". Hunting and equestrian sports were already very popular in England at that time and were part of social life, especially for the nobility.