This is a list of female bullfighters who are notably participating, or have in the past participated, in bullfighting. Women in bullfighting has been traced to the sport's earliest renditions in Spain, namely during the late-1700s and early-1800s. Spanish painter Francisco Goya first depicted a female bullfighter in his etching work La Pajuelera, which featured a woman sparring with a bull on horseback in 1816. [1] During the Spanish Civil War of the 1930s, women were forced to exile in other Spanish-speaking countries and the United States in order to continue bullfighting. [2] In Spain – along with many countries in Latin America and Asia – women were banned from the sport. They were banned from bullfighting in Spain until 1974, [3] and in Japan until 2018. [4]
Women had difficulty completing their alternativa, a ceremony where a bullfighter becomes a matador, during the 1980s due to the social pressures of the decade. [5] Spanish bullfighter Cristina Sánchez was the first woman matador in Europe, gaining full status in 1996. [6]
A bullfighter is a performer in the activity of bullfighting. Torero or toureiro, both from Latin taurarius, are the Spanish and Portuguese words for bullfighter and describe all the performers in the activity of bullfighting as practised in Spain, Portugal, Mexico, Peru, France, Colombia, Ecuador, Venezuela and other countries influenced by Portuguese and Spanish culture. The main performer and leader of the entourage in a bullfight, and who finally kills the bull, is addressed as maestro (master), or with the formal title matador de toros. The other bullfighters in the entourage are called subalternos and their suits are embroidered in silver as opposed to the matador's gold. They include the picadores, rejoneadores, and banderilleros.
Cristina Sánchez de Pablos is a Spanish bullfighter who gained prominence during the 1990s for being one of the first female bullfighters. She is the first woman to complete her alternativa in Europe.
Juan Belmonte García was a Spanish bullfighter. He fought in a record number of bull fights and was responsible for changing the art of bullfighting. He had minor deformities in his legs which forced him to design new techniques and styles of bullfighting.
Manuel Laureano Rodríguez Sánchez, known as Manolete, was a Spanish bullfighter.
Rafael Molina Sánchez, called Lagartijo (lizard), was a Spanish bullfighter.
Manolete, also known as The Passion Within in the United Kingdom, Blood and Passion in Canada, and A Matador's Mistress in the United States, is a 2008 biopic of bullfighter Manuel Laureano Rodríguez Sánchez, better known as "Manolete". The film was written and directed by Menno Meyjes. This is the first film from HandMade Films since Lock, Stock and Two Smoking Barrels (1998).
Francisco de Asís Rivera Ordóñez is a Spanish torero or 'bullfighter'.
A picador is one of the pair of horse-mounted bullfighters in a Spanish-style bullfight that jab the bull with a lance. They perform in the tercio de varas, which is the first of the three stages in a stylized bullfight.
Concepción Cintrón Verrill, also known as Conchita Cintrón or La Diosa de Oro, was a Chile-born Peruvian torera, perhaps the most famous in the history of bullfighting. In the ring Cintrón was said to display particular grace, style and bravado, a combination known as duende.
Blood and Sand is a 1941 American romantic Technicolor film starring Tyrone Power, Linda Darnell, Rita Hayworth, and Nazimova. Directed by Rouben Mamoulian, it was produced by 20th Century Fox and was based on the 1908 Spanish novel, which was critical of bullfighting, Blood and Sand, by Vicente Blasco Ibanez. The supporting cast features Anthony Quinn, Lynn Bari, Laird Cregar, J. Carrol Naish, John Carradine and George Reeves. Rita Hayworth's singing voice was dubbed by Gracilla Pirraga.
Spanish-style bullfighting is a type of bullfighting that is practiced in Spain, Mexico, Colombia, Ecuador, Venezuela, Peru, as well as in parts of southern France and Portugal. This style of bullfighting involves a physical contest with humans attempting to publicly subdue, immobilize, or kill a bull. The most common bull used is the Spanish Fighting Bull, a type of cattle native to the Iberian Peninsula. This style of bullfighting is seen to be both a sport and performance art. The red colour of the cape is a matter of tradition – bulls are color blind. They attack moving objects; the brightly-colored cape is used to mask blood stains.
Portuguese-style bullfighting differs in many aspects from Spanish-style bullfighting, most notably in the fact that the bull is not killed in front of an audience in the arena. The cavaleiros and the forcados are unique to the Portuguese variety of bullfighting, as well as the participation of horsewomen (cavaleiras) in the routines.
Michel Lagravère Peniche is a French Mexican bullfighter.
Bullfighting is a physical contest that involves a bullfighter attempting to subdue, immobilize, or kill a bull, usually according to a set of rules, guidelines, or cultural expectations.
Jairo Miguel is a bullfighter child prodigy.
Bullfighting was banned in the Spanish autonomous community of Catalonia by a vote of the Catalan Parliament in July 2010. The ban came into effect on January 1, 2012. The last bullfight in the region took place on 25 September 2011 at La Monumental. The ban was officially annulled for being unconstitutional by Spain's highest court on October 5, 2016. However, despite the overturning of the ban, no further bullfight had taken place in Catalonia as of July 2020.
Le petit picador jaune is an oil on wood painting by the Spanish artist Pablo Picasso, which he created in 1889 at the age of eight. It is considered to be the earliest known surviving work by the artist. The painting is a colourful representation of a Spanish bullfight, a subject which Picasso repeatedly returned to throughout his career.
Events in the year 2009 in Portugal.
Conchi Reyes Ríos is a Spanish bullfighter. In 2011, she was the first woman to take two ears off a bull. In 2015, she was featured on a Spanish national list of bullfighters, one of six women out of 825.
Hilda Eliana Tenorio Patiño is a Mexican bullfighter and matador. She was the first woman to receive her alternativa in the Plaza de Toros México, the largest bullring in the world, aged 24. Tenorio completed her alternativa on February 28, 2010. She has been an outspoken advocate of feminism in the sport. She is the third Mexican woman to attain the rank of matador.
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