Diomed etc

[After George Stubbs, "Diomed", 19th century, mezzotint on paper. Clark Art Institute, 1955.1993. At 225 South Street Williamstown, Massachusetts]

The first day

Continuing the story about horses, started at reference 1, as in the 'Evocation of Speed' in the Market Square. The Gemini story about the one-time Derby winners Diomed and Galileo and about how the sculptress got her period detail for Diomed from old prints.. 

Wikipedia offers a low grade version of the image above, while the Clark in Massachusetts offers a tiff - something I have not come across for a while - at 109Mb. Which was too strong for Blogger, so I loaded the Snipping Tool version above - a 1.4Mb png.

Gemini tells me that the original lurks in some private collection somewhere and only rarely gets into public view. Although, at some point, the owner of the painting must have given access to the engraver - and I dare say money changed hands, mass produced engravings being big business, certainly by the nineteenth century. Maybe that was all part of the original deal with Stubbs.

While Paint loads the tiff and converts to a 7.3Mb jpg. This second image, as published by Blogger, might be a little sharper on my laptop than the first, but it is hard to be sure.

And I can't tell the difference under zoom between the big tiff and the medium jpg - the bit left being one of the points of interest. The image above is the Snipping Tool's take of a zoom of the tiff loaded into Photos. Perhaps the jpg is strong enough for the mezzotint, although I have refrained, so far anyway, from looking up what the resolution of a mezzotint might be.

At this point I thought I had better check that the two horses are indeed supposed to be Diomed and Galileo. 

'To celebrate the Millennium Epsom and Ewell Town Council commissioned Judy to create an iconic sculpture that connected the town to the famous Derby race on Epsom Downs. The result is that Judy has taken the very first winner of the Derby, Diomed in 1780, racing against the new Millennium winner Gallileo through the symbolic winner’s circle. The image of Diomed has been taken from oil paintings and therefore is shown in the true artistic style of the time with the jockey riding in long stirrups, and the horse’s tack being of the period too. Gallileo, on the other hand, is shown with horse and rider in the modern day style, short stirrups and tack.

The concept was designed to represent the essence and speed of an actual race, just as if they were racing head to head, past against the present and on into the future. The most important part of a race is the nose passing the winning post, and in this case, less is more and the focal point are the heads.

Originally in the Derby Square in Epsom, the sculpture is to be relocated into the new refurbished Market Square'.

Which is indeed the case, as confirmed by the sculptress at reference 4. Gemini is right about that bit, as I had previously assumed. I have corrected the misspelling of 'Millennium'.

And while I was about it, what about the name of the square it was temporarily housed in? Gmaps today has Derby Square (east) and Oaks Square (west), just below the library. My recollection is that the statue now in the Market Square used to be in what gmaps is now calling Oaks Square and which might have then been called Ebbisham Square - Ebbisham being another word with a connection to Epsom. One more thing to check tomorrow.

The second day

During the first day, I had strolled down to the Market Place to take a proper look at the 'Evocation of Speed' sculpture and to take a few snaps with which to verify the Gemini story.

Galileo side. Complete with the name on the saddle blanket. The today's short stirrups.

Diomed side, Also complete with the name of the saddle blanket. No feet, but we do have a standing rather than a crouching posture, in the old style.

From a bit further back.A curious mix of the skeletal and the realistic. I associate to the German who used to turn bodies into art works. All a bit grim. Inter alia, we were told he had a waiting list of people waiting to be so treated. Bing reminds me that he was called Dr. Gunther von Hagens. At least dull bronze (or whatever it is) is much more tasteful than the real thing, coloured up with the various chemicals involved in preservation. And then there is the large decapitated horse at Hyde Park, replicated at Wisley. All very Medieval, very Bosch.

I had not known that the semicircular frame to the sculpture stood for the red circles on the top of the winning posts.

I had an interesting talk with Gemini about the difference between the two hats. They don't look very different - although there are differences - but one is a straightforward cap, made in more or less one piece, while the other is a modern safety helmet, with a soft visor just stuck on the front.

A zoom of the old style bit which Gemini had also told me all about. Not the same as the one in the mezzotint, although more interesting, more striking visually.

Note also the very simple bridle.

I had a talk with Gemini about the bit. He made a few slips along the way, but in the end there is a pretty good story, part of which is snapped above. Once again, a case of working with him to get the right answer; you have to do a bit more than ask the question.

There is talk of curb bits, although the bit sculpted is not much like those at reference 5. 

And I have been reminded of the origins of horse racing in hunting and in the cavalry regiments - where strength and stamina were as important as speed and horses were bigger and heavier than those used for racing today. I associate this morning to the horse race in 'Anna Karenina', the race in which the horse was killed by rider mistake. This was a race for military men.

And Gemini clearly signs up to the view that there can never be too much flattery!

The plinth is very neatly made, but is clearly not solid. Some kind of chromium plated, heavy steel plates on top of some kind of interior frame? Would ordinary stainless steel polish up and hold its polish like this?

Unfortunately, I don't have contact details for the metal polisher that I had met in December, a metal polisher who would certainly have known. Just the sort of project that he might have been involved in.

Someone has gone to a bit of bother with the jagged join in the middle. Very neatly done.

A digression

And while we are on horse racing, which attracts a lot of betting, there is the piece at reference 6. To what extent is it OK for betting companies to make a lot of money out of people who bet rather more than they should?

'... Betfair is defending the claim. Jonathan Hough KC, for the company, said in a written submission that accepting the claimants’ arguments would undermine the principle of personal autonomy … Joshua Swift, a partner at law firm Withers, who is not involved in the case, described the case as “a potential turning point” because it will consider whether English courts are prepared “to revisit the longstanding position that operators do not owe a general duty of care”...'.

I suppose the ground is shifting, with it now being widely accepted that it is not very OK to sell stuff which people want, but which gives them lung cancer - that is to say tobacco.

An issue not that far removed from that of abuse of social media: to what extent is it OK to sell computing products which enable bad things to happen, bad things which would probably not happen otherwise? 

See also the linked piece at reference 7. And the rather dense piece from the government at reference 8: this swingeing remote gaming duty had passed me by. I don't think that remote betting on horses is included, although the text includes neither 'horse' nor 'racing'.

I associate to Denise Coates, who has made a great deal of money out of making it easier for people to bet and who has figured in these pages from time to time - finding which figures is left as an exercise for the reader. Bing does not turn up much in the way of good quality images - perhaps she is a private person - with this one coming from the Stoke Sentinel at reference 9. But see also reference 10.

Also to the sale of guns in the US.

Conclusions

Even when going to this amount of bother, it is hard to check the story out properly. Just having the images is not enough: one needs to know (and care) about horse racing and its history, and better still one would have access to the artist. Gemini certainly helps, but he is not the whole story, as it were. Not yet, anyway. Inter alia, that will take better integration of word and image processing and access to a truly Gargantuan library of images. It is not always convenient to stroll down to the Market Square - and it was raining. There is a glimpse of the handle of my umbrella in one of the snaps above: I had to put it somewhere.

Integration not yet available to the likes of me, that is. The piece at reference 11 suggests that the stuff available to people with money and to governments is coming on at pace - to use a phrase that pops up everywhere these days. Had not been invented when I was still in the world of work. Very appropriate it is too for a racing story.

I associate to my mother's dictum - she was a long-service teacher - that there was no golden road to learning. You have to do the work. A dictum which I think might be relevant here: one does not just want an answer to some question, one also wants some context for both question and answer, context which cannot be condensed to a few words without massive loss of information content. Even with careful choice of words.

And thinking with my fingers, I close with the thought that one might be as careful as one likes to get just the right word for something or other - this in the interests of brevity - but that only works if your reader has much the same cloud of meaning around the word you light on as you do. Which goes to the need for language to be reasonably shared and stable to be useful. Too much movement is confusing.

To be thought about. Maybe thought about the old fashioned penchant for learning lists of facts, facts like the tallest mountain in Africa, the longest river in India.

References

Reference 1: https://psmv6.blogspot.com/2026/06/fake-200.html.

Reference 2: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/1780_Epsom_Derby.

Reference 3: https://www.clarkart.edu/artpiece/detail/Diomed.

Reference 4: https://judyboyt.com/evocation-of-speed/.

Reference 5: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Curb_bit.

Reference 6: Betfair targeted gambling addict, court hears in landmark case: Flutter-owned company accused of worsening addiction of Luke Ashton before he took his life - Alistair Gray, Stephanie Stacey, Financial Times - 2026.

Reference 7: The government should raise the stakes when it comes to gambling: Despite some positive proposals, there are significant omissions on advertising and compensation for victims - Janet O'Sullivan, Financial Times - 2023.

Reference 8: https://www.gov.uk/government/publications/excise-notice-455a-remote-gaming-duty/excise-notice-455a-remote-gaming-duty.

Reference 9: https://www.stokesentinel.co.uk/news/business/charity-set-up-bet365-boss-6884275.

Reference 10: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Denise_Coates.

Reference 11: New AI espionage powers trigger Putin camera scare: Russia paused surveillance system after killing of Iran’s Supreme Leader exposed how AI can be used on CCTV data to target enemies - Mehul Srivastava, Christopher Miller, Financial Times - 2026.