Monday 12 January 2009

Goddess of the Bullring


1944 promotional poster




Conchita Cintrón & Horse by Henry Clarke
Vogue, September 1968








Image of Conchita Cintrón by Henry Clarke, 1968.




Taking a bow after dispatching her first 700-pound bull, Tijuana, Mexico, 1941.



La Diosa Rubia in action, 1945.


The bullfighter Conchita Cintrón (b.1922) was known as, La Diosa Rubia, the Blonde Goddess. The half-American, Peruvian raised Cintrón was one of the most famous and respected bullfighters of the 1930s and '40s. A professional rejoneadora, a horse-riding bullfighter, only because it was illegal for a woman to make a kill on foot.

Her final standoff in the ring came in 1949. In September 1951 Conchita Cintrón married Francisco Castelo Branco, the nephew of her trainer.They settled in Portugal, where she raised six children and established the Al-Gharb Kennels.




Goddess of the Bullring: The Story of Conchita Cintrón, the World’s Greatest Matador by Lola Verrill Cintrón (Bobbs-Merrill Co., 1960)

Memoirs of a Bullfighter by Conchita Cintrón (Holt, Rinehart & Winston, 1968)

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9 comments:

Pigtown-Design said...

That second image is incredible. Thanks for sharing.

xo

Mrs. Blandings said...

Raising six children must have seemed like a piece of cake after fighting bulls. Wish I'd thought of it.

HOBAC said...

Mrs B - Or, the other way round? Though, help at that time in Portugal would have been plentiful and readily available.

HOBAC said...

PD - very Georgia O'Keeffe, no?

An Aesthete's Lament said...

I absolutely love this woman. What a fabulous life. And thank God Madonna hasn't thought to turn it into a movie.

Tobi said...

I am smitten.

g said...

Sounds fascinating! Another thing to add to my book list.

Renee Finberg said...

i am a horse woman.......the white horse is the bomb.

Emily said...

I love this woman, how interesting her life is! It's a pity that the Hollywood lost her story!