Pennsylvania Riding Academy

The Lost Quixotes: the Art of Collecting the Riding Horse

Paul Belasik announces the release of The Lost Quixotes, The Art of Collecting the Riding Horse, a forty-eight minute documentary film.
Over two years in the making, this film explores the concept of collection, the old masters who created it, and the current science that continues to shape it. It has been created to help riders across all disciplines connect the works of the old masters on collection to state-of-the-art bio-mechanical research. The cameras take you inside the McPhail Center, the renowned bio-mechanical laboratory for sport horses at Michigan State University, to look at an experiment that, for the first time in history, measured the forces of the levade. A beautifully shot section along the Atlantic coast, at Assategue Island National Park contains an enthralling piece from one of the leading authorities on wild horses and horse behavior and its ramifications for the domestic horse owner. "I didn't want to make another how-to video," says Belasik. “It is my hope that this visually unique DVD may shed some light on the increasingly tense schism between competition and classical dressage.” Featured are demonstrations of the daily exercises that are the common ground of both, in an engaging film that
should have appeal far beyond specialist riders. Paul Belasik is a highly respected international rider, trainer, writer and teacher, and an avowed proponent of classical equestrian ideals. A graduate of Cornell
University, Belasik has ridden and trained at every level in dressage, from young horses to beyond Grand Prix, and has successfully competed at the highest levels in international competition. He is probably best known for his popular books Dressage for the 21st Century and his trilogy, Riding Towards the Light, Exploring Dressage Technique and The Songs of Horses. Paul Belasik gives clinics, lectures, and demonstrations internationally, and trains a wide cross-section of clients at his Pennsylvania Riding Academy at Lost Hollow Farm. His training methods focus not only on the practical, physical point of view, but also with a keen eye toward the artistic, scientific, and philosophical components of horsemanship as well. For more information, visit http://www.belasikvideoassociates.com.

THIS IS A MASTERPIECE! No one but Paul Belasik could have produced such an interesting, entertaining, and at times, rather moving presentation. Through his absorbing dialogue, original drawings, graphics, photographs, ancient books, interviews, locations, old/new/standard/overhead/slow motion video, beautiful music, glimpses of wild horses and his own trained domestic horses: through his meticulous attention to every single detail in the making: through his obvious dedication to the study of the written word, which he then took directly to his horses: through his enthusiasm to scientifically and publicly test those principles. Through his honesty, humility, generosity, humour and passion: and finally through his own and his assistant Andrea Velas’s ridden demonstration of the school exercises, longitudinal and lateral—each and every one labeled onscreen of course—showing both immaculate rider position and the absolute precision of step required to earn the respect of the competition world…we just cannot fail to get a FEEL for the very essence of Classical Horsemanship and understand WHY there are those who are so passionate that it is never lost to all future generations.

-Elaine Herbert; Midlothian, Scotland

review for The Classical Riding Club, Summer 2008