Lot 19: Troye, Edward - Nina

Nina This painting is the one referenced on page 313 of Alexander Mackay-Smith’s book The Race Horses of America as one of the two from the Whitney Collection of Sporting Art that was deaccessioned from Yale in exchange for a John James Audubon. The New York gallery that received the painting named it “Nina,” and it could be Nina, based on another known portrait of the horse by Troye. Mackay-Smith was unable to verify with absolute certainty which horse this might be but also speculates it could have been a mare belonging to James Grinstead of Kentucky, possibly Kelpie. Francis P. Garvan assembled and later gave Yale University what would become the core of its American art collection; along with this he bestowed the finest collection of sporting art ever assembled in this country, named in honor of his two friends and fellow Yale alumni, Harry Payne Whitney and Payne Whitney.

25" x 30"

Oil on canvas

H.P. Whitney Collection of Sporting Art, Yale University James Graham and Sons, New York Private Collection

Signed, dated May 28, 1869