This past year, Stolen Horse International accepted an unusual request for a listing. It seems that Gifted, a famous dressage horse, was missing. However, it's not the actual horse that has disappeared, but rather a valuable life-size painting of the beautiful Hanoverian gelding.

After traveling across country on tour at art exhibits, the painting was to be returned to New York. However, it was never shipped from the last gallery in which it was displayed. So Gifted's painting was last known to be in Half Moon Bay, California.

The photograph is of this extraordinary work of art, and below is a press release issued by Gifted's owner, Carol Lavell, and the artist, Patricia Powers.

Please contact Stolen Horse International or Patricia Powers if you have any idea where this work of art now resides.

More information can be found on NetPosse.com at: http://www.netposse.com/stolenmissing/missing_1/
Gifted_Painting_CAmissing1997.htm

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For more information contact: 
Patricia Powers 
129 Mambert Road 
Hudson, New York 12534 
518-851-2468 
greydun@greydun.com

Gifted's Life-size Portrait is Missing

Wellington, Florida - "Gifted," Carol Lavell's famous equine partner and Olympic Bronze Medal winner had his portrait painted in life size oil by Patricia Powers. This extraordinary painting, completed in 1993, was very well known in the dressage community. Many art enthusiasts have had the pleasure of viewing Gifted's 8 x 11 foot oil portrait in exhibitions throughout the country.

Carol Lavell, a two-time winner of the US Olympic Committee Female Equestrian Athlete of the Year, was delighted when she first saw the completed portrait of her renowned horse. "Gifted loved to passage," she said. "He would actually turn his head down to watch his feet. Patricia caught that exact moment in this painting. He had enormous power and loved to show it."

When Patricia Powers finished her graduate studies she had not intended to add specific horses to her series of life-size canvases. She changed her mind the day she saw Carol Lavell's famous dressage horse, Gifted, performing at Gladstone, NJ.

"He had such presence," said Powers, "Gifted was so impressive. I immediately wanted to do a large painting of him." Upon introducing myself to Carol Lavell, I was given a firm no. She was unfamiliar with my work. Powers, the consummate artist, felt that an example of her work could change Lavell's mind. She painted a 22" x 28" oil of him at the extended trot, and brought it to Devon. Lavell decided to cooperate with Powers on the spot. 

Carol rode Gifted in every dressage movement possible. Not satisfied, Powers suggested they passage around her as she lay on the ground and photographed them from a totally different angle. This result produced the unique bearing of the horse, captured the way Powers had envisioned it.

"My paintings go all over the world as ambassadors, Powers said, "I paint them life size because they are more convincing." No one who ever saw Gifted's portrait would ever doubt his generosity of spirit or the earnest performance he delivered in every competition.

Gifted's portrait was unveiled at a private showing in Saratoga Springs and then traveled to art galleries from New York to California. In 1998 it was to be returned to the New York studio. It never arrived. After an extensive search Powers located the owner of the art gallery in Half Moon Bay, California where the painting was last exhibited. She claims she left the painting rolled in a tube for the shipping company, which has since gone out of business.

Patricia Powers wanted Carol to have the finished piece when it completed touring. The loss of Gifted's painting is felt not only by Lavell and Powers, but also by the equine art-loving world.

This painting of Gifted could possibly be hanging in the United States, Canada or even Europe. Perhaps the present "owner" is unaware of its history and just considers it to be a great painting of a beautiful horse. If you have seen it hanging somewhere, or have knowledge of its whereabouts, please contact Patricia Powers at (518) 851-2468 or greydun@greydun.com Replies will remain anonymous.

Stolen Horse International, a non-profit organization, is also searching for the Gifted painting. Normally these dedicated volunteers locate living horses that have been stolen, but President, Debi Metcalfe, took this project to heart, and enlisted her many resources of investigative contacts, TV and radio stations and countless forms of printed media across the country to help. If you have any information about the painting please email it to stolenhorse@netposse.com.