Thoughts on old painting of child & large draft horse

Found this at a thrift store today - when I first saw it I thought I'd found an old master work! BUT, maybe I'm just seeing it wrong (and I'd fail a Rorschach/ink spot test) - to me looking at it when cropping photos to post here, it looks like a deflated black horse's head draped over the draft horse's neck?? You can even see the ear directly behind the white ear near top of neck - what is that?! (don't laugh - I didn't want to put that here but - it's stuck in my head until someone shows me what it really is (please!) lol
Part of his mane?

Also it looks like W.(?) Jean was artist - does anyone know who it was?

Thanks

 

Think it's just the leather collar of a draft horse.

 

@KSW

 

I hate to say this (so frequently) but I think this is modern and Chinese.

 

The white on the head is the mane.

 

Could have been meant for something like this:


but someone decided the second horse just wasn't going to work.

 

I think it’s a sack or bag draped over the neck. Think it’s modern painting and likely a copy of an older painting.

 

Definitely looks like print, not paint, on canvas.

 

I agree. Field collar for a draft horse.

 

It's a painting I looked with a magnifying glass and I can see & feel ridges from brush stroke with too much paint

 

To me it looks like the boy's coat, or a sack as Houseful suggested. It is oddly done though, and I also saw a horse's head at first.

I agree with the others that say it looks like a modern copy of an old painting. It might be that it looks odd because the modern copier didn't understand the thing they were painting on the horse's neck (i.e. a very badly painted collar).

 

That does appear to be a new decorative copy of an older painting. The artist's hand is modern and the painting's back is not as old as the front purports to be. Have you done a Google Image search?

Debora

 

I think it is a sack with the corners tied up to make handles.
Cute picture.

 

Looks like part of the harness.

Debora