THEY are a reminder of a long-vanished age when English aristocrats liked nothing better than breeding racehorses and hunting on their vast estates.

These were the kind of scenes depicted by Liverpool-born artist George Stubbs, two of whose paintings are now on loan to the Walker Art Gallery from the Duke of Westminster’s Collection.

They were commissioned by the Duke’s 18th-century ancestor, the Baron Grosvenor, later 1st Earl Grosvenor.

Mares and Foals is a portrait of some of Grosvenor’s favourite horses, while The Grosvenor Hunt shows him with his brother and his friends on the same Cheshire estate where the present Duke now lives.

Stubbs (1724-1806) established himself in the Georgian era as the most sought-after painter of horses, and arguably became the greatest animal painter in the history of art.

Laura MacCulloch, curator of British art at the Walker, said the loan followed the gallery’s successful exhibition of Stubbs’s work in 2006.

She said: “Mares and Foals is in such pristine condition and is almost as fresh as the day it was painted, which is very unusual for a painting from a private collection.

“Both paintings give an insight into what the aristocrats were up to in the 18th century.

“It shows they really loved their animals and wanted portraits of them.”

The paintings join other Stubbs works from the Walker’s own collection, showing his great talent in painting a variety of animals.

The Walker’s paintings include The Lincolnshire Ox, A Horse Frightened By a Lion, and Molly Longlegs.

There is a further link to the city because Stubbs’s father, who worked in the leather trade, had a workshop in nearby Dale Street.