Biographical Information

Harry Hall
British 1814-1882

Born in Cambridge, this artist is first recorded working at Tattersalls, London. He contributed to British Racehorse and The Sporting Review, and he was for a while chief artist on The Field and also contributed to The Illustrated London News. He moved to Newmarket, presumably to be at the heart of major racing center, as his work was almost entirely racehorse portraits. Hall exhibited at all the major exhibitions. He was the father of Sydney Prior Hall (1842-1920) who was also an artist of great ability exhibiting variety of non-sporting pictures at the Royal Academy.

Many of Hall’s racehorse portraits were engraved and published after his work. He died on April 22 nd, at this house in Newmarket High Street.

Hall was the major racehorse portraitist of his time, and filled the gap left by J.F. Herring Senior. He occasionally painted hunters, shooting and rabbiting scenes but these are rare. He was a very capable artist and at his best his racehorse portraiture is comparable to that or Herring, Sr., the human portraitures in his pictures were good and one feels his subjects must have been easily recognizable. With his horses, Hall tended to follow fashion in giving them particularly small heads and excessively strong quarters. He normally signed and dated his work.

*Special thanks to Sally Mitchell