Glen Helen

Agnes Mills

Though we can’t be sure, this is likely an image of Glen Helen preserve in Yellow Springs, OH; specifically, of the Riding Centre located in the southwest section of the park. The founder of the Riding Centre, Louise Soelberg, was a former Modern dancer and dance professor at Antioch College who, after a back injury ended her career in 1959, opened the therapeutic horseback riding organization. Still in operation today, it provides affordable lessons in equestrian skills to children, Antioch students, and people recovering from physical and mental injury or challenge.

It is very possible that, through Agnes Mills’ extensive work with the dance world, the two artists were friends or acquaintances. Mills may have visited Soelberg at the Riding Centre and created this haunting image of silhouetted horses and a rider traversing through a dark forest, the textured trunk of a large tree in the foreground. The center is bordered by the forested grounds of the preserve.