So what's the story?

This was the first drawing Didi ever did that moved away from the realism of her earlier work (she would have been aged 11 or 12 when this one was executed). At the time, Didi (an avid horse lover) was caught up with the fact that the racehorse, "Aldiniti", who was ridden to victory in the 1981 Grand National by Bob Champion, happened to be owned by friends of her family. The whole Bob Champion and Aldiniti story impressed and moved her and was what inspired her to attempt to draw a horse race.

However, Didi would previously have attempted to draw this subject using pen and ink and realism. But the strange combination of humiliation and compliments from her art mistress, Mrs Caddick, the gist of which was that she said she knew that Didi could see more in her subjects than she was showing and that she was being boring, got Didi frustrated and angry enough to "show her" - very Didi!

Something in Didi's head made her draw it in a way that wasn't just a superficial study of form, but looked deeper - at the muscle striations of the horse. Didi found herself researching equine anatomy to try and replicate musculature in her drawing, alongside using pointalism and other impressionist techniques for the background components. Didi's critical art mistress loved it - despite its poor execution, the art mistress could see the potential - and it went on exhibition in the school.

Didi didn't mean to communicate anything in this particular painting. It was only later that Didi learned that she could communicate her distress at being bullied and other confusions in her life in the way that she had already been doing with her previous drawings, but combine it with surrealist techniques rather than realistic ones. But, this painting was a significant start on a journey - it opened Didi's mind up to seeing objects and her environment in a whole different way.

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