This paper draws on social and art history, cultural studies and 'gaze theory' to explore how William Powell Frith's painting of Derby Day, and the various responses to it, shed light on the Epsom Derby horse race and the ways in which its multiple meanings as a mega-event were produced...
PaintingArt exhibitsColonies & territoriesLibrariesArt historyAntipodean populations in the 1860s craved visual entertainment and popular spectacle and the 1864–65 exhibition of William Powell Frith's famous Royal Academy picture Derby Day (1856–8) was hailed as the first modern masterwork to tour ...