A Collector’s Passion for the Art of Rosa Bonheur

By Carolyn Sill

The Bonheur bug bit Frederick Billings. In the early 1860s, while travelling in Europe to buy arms for the Union Army, Billings fell in love with the works of several European artists. Among his favorites was French artist Rosa Bonheur (1822-1899). In 1871, he bought an engraving of her work The Horse Fair and proudly displayed it in his mansion. He also purchased an engraving of Rosa Bonheur with a Steer (also known as Portrait of Rosa Bonheur), artist Edouard Louis Dubufe’s depiction of Bonheur (and a bovine buddy). Just who was this woman, and why did her work have such a hold on Billings?

Portrait of Rosa Bonheur (1896)
Engraved by Joseph Bishop Pratt after a painting by Consuelo Fould.

The Elisha Whittelsey Collection, The Elisha Whittelsey Fund, 1980
Object Number: 1980.1093
Public domain. Image courtesy of The Metropolitan Museum of Art.

Bonheur’s art stands out among the other works in the Marsh-Billings-Rockefeller National Historical Park museum collection. Many of the collection’s paintings were by members of the Hudson River School, an American art movement devoted to painting landscapes. In contrast, Bonheur, who was French, was an animalier, or someone who painted animals. The Hudson River School painters emphasized the wide expanses of America’s wilderness, usually from a distance so that the viewer can take in the whole scene. Bonheur’s subjects were in the foreground, sometimes very close-up, and while her backgrounds were detailed, the emphasis was on the animals. Yet, despite these differences, there are many themes shared by Bonheur and the School, namely those of man and nature.

Bonheur had a deep love and respect for animals. She seemed to love them even more than she did her fellow humans. Never married, she is known to have once said that the only males she had any time for were the bulls she painted. Bonheur’s works are known for being very realistic: one can see the muscles rippling in the legs of her horses, feel the hot breath of her stags. This is largely because Bonheur did her research. She would enter slaughterhouses, horse shows, and Paris’ National Veterinary Institute for anatomical references. Most of these places were off-limits to women at the time, so Bonheur obtained an official cross-dressing permit from the French government allowing her to enter these places while wearing trousers.

The Horse Fair by Rosa Bonheur (1852–55). This monumental version, measuring 7 by 14 feet, is currently on display at The Metropolitan Museum of Art.

The Metropolitan Museum of Art, Gift of Cornelius Vanderbilt, 1887 (Accession Number: 87.25)
Public domain. Image courtesy of The Metropolitan Museum of Art.

Bonheur’s most famous work is The Horse Fair. (The original work, currently in the Metropolitan Museum of Art, is 7 feet tall and 14 feet wide. Billings’ engraved copy was significantly smaller!) The scene depicted is what one would think is a mundane event-men selling live horses-but the representation is epic. Horses kick up dirt clouds and rear up with their riders on their backs. One horse in the background refuses to move as its handlers tug on the bridle. Closer to the observer, one man attempts to grab a horse’s face as it pulls back in defiance. Part of why this painting has endured so long is the way it portrays the horses as living, breathing creatures. Animals have appeared in art since cave paintings, but often, they are used as metaphors for human emotions or concepts. Animals in art may also be drawn in a less realistic way for the aesthetics' sake. Bonheur refused to do either, instead making accurate horses the full focus. Oddly, the lack of human emotions on display ironically makes the painting more open to interpretation. Are the horses afraid of what is being done to them, or are they just stubborn? Are the men being rough with the horses, or are they considerate, and this is the only way to get them to cooperate? These are just some questions that may spring to mind when viewing the painting.

Study for "The Horse Fair" (1852–1855)
Rosa Bonheur (French, 1822–1899)
Black chalk, with gray wash and white highlights, on buff paper

The Metropolitan Museum of Art, Purchase, Mr. and Mrs. Claus von Bülow Gift, 1975 (1975.319.2). Public domain.

There are many reasons why Billings may have been drawn to the painting. The most obvious is, of course, that The Horse Fair is a beautiful, exciting work. Billings may have felt a personal connection as well: he bred Morgan horses and had (ultimately unsuccessful) plans to buy the local fairground where livestock auctions took place. In any case, Billings’ choice to put it in his dining room was unusual. During the Victorian era, it was common for dining rooms art to depict animals, albeit dead ones. Usually representing “after the hunt” scenes, such as dogs carrying dead pheasants or stags bleeding out, these were macho images that the men of the house would put up so as to seem tough to guests. Thus, it was unusual for Billings to put a depiction of alive-and-kicking animals in such a place. Ironically for a piece that avoids giving human traits to animals, Billings may have seen himself as a strong, spirited horse pushing on against the hardships in his life that wanted to rein him in, and proudly showed the painting to guests as a way of saying, “I won’t let anybody stop me from doing what I want to do”.

Portrait de Rosa Bonheur (1857) or "Rosa Bonheur with a Steer"
Rosa Bonheur and Édouard Louis Dubufe (French, 1819–1883)
Oil on canvas

Collection of the Palace of Versailles, France. Public domain.

Also in the dining room, Billings displayed an engraving of Edouard Louis Dubufe’s Rosa Bonheur with a Steer, which is exactly what it sounds like. While Dubufe did most of the work on the portrait, Bonheur herself painted the steer, whom she affectionately pets. It’s fitting that the great painter of beasts would only sit for a portrait if she could paint a beast! Billings had the engraving framed and displayed alongside a self-portrait by the animalier Sir Edwin Landseer and referred to the works and portraits in the dining room as “the two great animal paintings-and man and woman”. Clearly, he had a deep respect for Bonheur and wanted everyone who visited him to know about her.

Etching of A Ghillie and Two Shetland Ponies in a Misty Landscape by Rosa Bonheur. In the collection at Marsh-Billings-Rockefeller National Historical Park.

NPS Photo/Dispenzirie

Another equine work by Bonheur, smaller in scale than The Horse Fair but no less epic, is Shetland Ponies. Instead of a small herd of horses and a team of men, this engraving depicts just two ponies and a young man, in traditional Scottish dress, trying to control them. The grey background and blowing of the ponies’ manes allow us to feel the chilly Highland air. The man’s annoyed face and the way he bends over makes us almost see his body shaking, his knuckles whitening. Again, the engraving is realistic and avoids giving the ponies human traits, yet there’s still much discussion to be had. Whose side are you on, the ponies who want to roam free, or the man who wants to lead them to safety? Interestingly, it was not Frederick Billings who bought this work, as the copy is marked 1891, and Billings died the year before. Perhaps one of his children was a Bonheur fan, relating to the animal characters on a personal level.

Eventually, the works were boxed up and stored in the attic, where they remained for decades. In the 1970s, when the Rockefellers were living in the house, Bonheur’s work got a second chance. Theodore Muller, the interior designer for the family, decided to move Rosa Bonheur with a Steer to the third-floor northeast bedroom. Rockefeller rode ponies as a child, horses as a teen, and competed in jumping shows as a young adult, so it’s not surprising that she’d have an interest in an artist like Bonheur. The Horse Fair was put back up on display, too, in the northwest bedroom on the second floor.

Today, visitors to Marsh-Billings-Rockefeller National Historical Park can once again bear witness to “the great animal paintings” and the portrait of the intrepid woman who made them.

For information on seeing Bonheur's work in person, or general information tours and programs at Marsh-Billings-Rockefeller National Historical Park, visit Ranger-Led Programs.