Jean François Raffaëlli was a mostly self-taught French painter, sculptor and printmaker, who was assigned to the impressionist style from 1880 on. He was also active as an actor and writer. Raffaëlli produced mostly costume pictures until 1876, when he began to depict the people of his time — particularly peasants, workers, and rag-pickers seen in Paris suburbs — in a realistic style. In his later years, he concentrated on color printmaking. Raffaëlli was French, but of Italian descent and lived and worked in and around Paris. He studied at the École des Beaux Arts and traveled to Italy, Spain and North Africa. In 1889 he won the gold medal at the World’s Fair and was appointed Knight and later Officer of the Legion of Honor. A few pictures related to sports were created by Raffaëlli. The most likely candidate is the color etching Le Grand Prix de Paris (also titled On the Racetrack), a scene from horse racing dated 1906.
France