Horses in Art Magazine - Art for the Horse Lover

Dreaming IS Believing

by Helen Ranta

Dream Race: The Search for the Greatest Thoroughbred Race Horse of All-Time - A book and paintings by Artist/Author Robert Clark.

"Trinity"
Oil by Robert Clark depicts Man o' War, Secretariat and Citation in the Dream Race.
At a high school reunion someone said they always remembered Robert Clark drawing horses when he was a kid, and writing was always encouraged by teachers. As a young artist the biggest criticism he received while earning his Bachelor's of fine art was that his paintings were too lyrical.

Clark remarks, "Regardless of their discouragement, I continued to tell stories with my painting. Now I've gone a step further and added words. One thing writing and painting have in common is how you can do either of them for hours and it feels like only minutes. That's when you know you are doing something you love."

Dream Race, The Search for the Greatest Thoroughbred Race Horse of All-Time, written and illustrated by Robert Clark, began as an outgrowth from a series of paintings. Clark explains, "These fantasy paintings called "Dream Race" were a visual debate of history's horse racing. Artist's license allowed me to play with the normally strict constraints of reality, but I did it without straying from the documented facts. This freedom allowed me to produce artwork, which I personally found satisfying as an artist and also very interesting as a sports enthusiast."

Clark researched paintings for the Dream Race for over three years, reading everything he could get his hands on about horse racing, including talking to real experts. In the book, a young reporter meets an old stable hand who takes him under his wing and helps him learn about the horses, the tracks, the jockeys and owners.

Clark's research revealed interesting bits of information that couldn't work into the canvases. Each race or painting has a theme, a common thread between a group of horses. The individual stories were woven together to create a field of horses that have never been arranged that way. The chapter titled Iron Horses features some recent stars like Cigar and John Henry, as well as Kelso and Forego from the sixties and seventies.

The chapter on the fabulous fillies of racing, titled Ladies First, was the result of interviewing fans at a show in Lexington, Kentucky. A couple months later, the painting Ladies First was finished with the horses the fans actually voted for: Ruffian, Genuine Risk, Winning Colors, and Regret.

Leonard, the old stable hand in the book, explains, "The dream race is in heaven. Do you know what heaven is? It's Hialeah in the winter, it's Churchill Downs the first Saturday in May, followed by Pimlico. It's Belmont in June; it's Saratoga in the summer and Santa Anita in the fall. That's what heaven is."

To learn more about Dream Race: the Search for the Greatest Thoroughbred Race Horse of All-Time visit www.RobertClark.us.

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