I have created quite a few horse drawings and paintings. And you may wonder about how some of them look. Maybe you associate them more with ponies? But let me enlighten you. This is what the original wild horses used to look like. We can still see these features in mustang herds in the United States, and also in the Polish konik horse. These horses roam free in my country of origin, The Netherlands, and I was asked to help observe them with my camera when my sister wrote a book about them.
Click on the link in the bottom of this page to read a remarkable story about a konik filly that I saved from drowning under the ice after just being born. It has some photographs of these horses as well and if you are interested in horses in general, you do not want to miss it!
When observing these horses, I got so obsessed with them, that I started to have trouble sleeping. They were on my mind day and night after a day of following the family groups around. The idea came to me that maybe I should sketch them. And it worked. I could finally sleep! But once the ‘hunger’ was awakened, I wanted more. And when a friend of mine donated his collection of high-quality pastels to me (thank you Nicol! RIP), there was no stopping me. I started to sketch in the field and then work on these roughs after getting home. What I depicted was not so much the positions of horses you usually see in paintings. No, I wanted to show typical horse behaviour. Such as flehmen. The drawing below (that is on my wall during the Studio Tour) shows this behaviour. It happens when a stallion wants to take a deep sniff of interesting female odours in the air. It is called the The flehmen response. The animal curls back its upper lip, exposing its front teeth, and inhales deeply. This action draws air into a specialized sensory organ, the vomeronasal organ (also called Jacobson’s organ), located in the roof of the mouth. This allows the stallion to intensely analyze scents, particularly non-volatile ones like pheromones. This is a response that can also be seen in other animals, such as cats. They too open their mouth to get more information about a particular scent.
And here is another interesting fact… The drawing below shows a stallion with the same behaviour. Additionally, you can see him pee. Did you know that stallions, when they smell female urine or excrement, they pee over it to show who owns this female? It tells other stallions that they are not the boss. Another stallion is.
If the stallion finds male poop or pee, though, the reaction is very different. The poop is extensively explored and then the stallion deposits its own excrement over it. This is also a sign to other stallions to tell everyone who is the boss. So… pooping is territorial behaviour directed at fellow males, peeing gives the seal of approval to the female that deposited it and also shows other who is the boss. So, do not look at the below drawing as a dirty picture, it is very normal stallion behaviour!
Below is the link to one of my stories about a konik filly that I saved from drowning. It is worth a read and a look and I hope you enjoy it. Once you have read it, the original of the ‘Tricky’ drawing will get a whole different meaning to you!
Click in the list below to select and view more backstories of my artworks.