Flashback: Kiki
“A horse is the projection of people’s dreams about themselves - strong, powerful, beautiful.”
I found Kiki at The Great Darke County Fair in the summer of 2009.
A standardbred pacer, she shared her stall with a sweet barn cat. They were both as kind and photogenic as could be.
This photo was captured in natural light with my Pentax K20D and my favorite, older-than-me SMC Pentax 50mm 1.4 manual lens at 1/90 with 200 ISO.
For a truly inspiring look at the relationship between people and horses, check out Homestretch (2007), a documentary airing on PBS. The Sonoma Valley Film Festival honoree tracks horses and prisoners working together toward redemption.
For a fictional look at the same subject, try The Mustang (2019) featuring Matthias Schoenaerts and Bruce Dern.
Most recently, Idris Elba and Method Man starred in Concrete Cowboy (2020), available on Netflix. The poignant coming-0f-age story about urban stables in North Philadelphia is based on the award-winning novel Ghetto Cowboy by G. Neri.
If you’re as inspired by these stories as I am, visit the Thoroughbred Retirement Foundation’s site to learn about their remarkable Second Chances program.
All the best,
Andrea
