Provenance
(Degas atelier sale number 1, 6-8 May 1918, Galerie Georges Petit, Paris, no. 5, as _Achille et le Bucéphale_). Dr. Hans Graber [1886-1956], Morcote, by 1951.[1] (Walter Hugelshofer, Zurich); (M. Knoedler and Co., New York) on joint account with (Pinakos, Inc., [Rudolf Heinemann], New York) from October 1956;[2] Lore Heinemann [Mrs. Rudolf J. Heinemann], New York; bequest 1997 to NGA.
[1] Lent to a 1951 exhibition in Bern from a private collection in Morcote; in Douglas Cooper, _Pastels by Edgar Degas_, New York, 1953, that collection is identified as Hans Graber. Graber was an art historian and collector who wrote on nineteenth century artists including Degas. The painting might have been exhibited at the Kunsthaus, Zurich, in 1929, according to Waldemar George, "L'Art en Suisse," _Formes_, 1929, p. 263.
[2] Knoedler stock book no. 10, p. 187, no. A6501, Getty Research Institute, Los Angeles (copy in NGA curatorial files). Knoedler's half was likely sold back to Pinakos, as the painting is next in the collection of Heinemann's widow Lore, who donated it to the National Gallery of Art.
Accession Number
1997.57.1
Medium
oil on canvas
Dimensions
overall: 115 x 89 cm (45 1/4 x 35 1/16 in.) | framed: 139.7 × 107.95 × 12.7 cm (55 × 42 1/2 × 5 in.)
Classification
Painting
Credit Line
Bequest of Lore Heinemann in memory of her husband, Dr. Rudolf J. Heinemann
Tags
Painting Impressionist & Modern (1851–1900) Oil Painting Canvas French
Background & Context
Background Story
Alexander and Bucephalus (c. 1859-1860) is an early work by Degas depicting the legendary encounter between Alexander the Great and his horse Bucephalus—a subject that allowed the young artist to combine his lifelong interest in horses with classical history. According to legend, Alexander tamed the apparently unbreakable horse Bucephalus when no one else could, recognizing that the horse was afraid of its own shadow. The 1859-60 date places this during Degas's student years, when he was studying under the Academic painter Louis Lamothe and absorbing the classical tradition that would inform even his most revolutionary later work. The painting's subject—heroic horsemanship drawn from ancient history—reflects the Academic training that Degas was simultaneously mastering and would eventually transform. Alexander and Bucephalus also reveals the interest in horses that would produce some of Degas's most celebrated works: the racecourse paintings of the 1860s-70s and the racing subjects that established him as the foremost painter of equestrian life in modern Paris. The horse's anatomy, rendered with the precision that Degas's Academic training demanded, already shows the observational skill that would later distinguish his racing subjects. The painting thus serves as a document of Degas's formation—the classical tradition and the equestrian interest that his mature work would revolutionize through their collision with modern experience.
Cultural Impact
Degas's early classical paintings influenced how his development was understood, documenting the Academic training that preceded his Impressionist innovations. The Alexander and Bucephalus subject influenced how equestrian history was represented in French Academic art, connecting ancient heroism to French horsemanship traditions. The painting influenced how Degas's lifelong interest in horses was understood, revealing its origins in classical training rather than in the racetrack subjects that made it famous.
Why It Matters
This painting matters because it reveals the origins of Degas's equestrian interest in classical training rather than modern racetrack culture—the young artist who painted Alexander and Bucephalus would become the painter of modern racing, but the classical foundation remains visible in even his most innovative later works.
