John Fulton; Artist and Bullfighter

John Fulton, 65, a Philadelphia artist who was a professional bullfighter in Spain. Fulton became enchanted with bullfighting at age 12 when he saw a movie about a doomed bullfighter, “Blood and Sand,” starring Rita Hayworth and Tyrone Power. He studied bullfighting while on a painting scholarship in San Miguel de Allende, Mexico, and practiced in Mexican border towns while serving with the Army in Texas. Fulton moved to Seville, Spain, and in 1963 became the first American to be confirmed as an official matador in Spain. Yet he never abandoned the easel, painting pictures of the bulls he killed. Never wealthy, he supplemented his meager matador’s income by selling the paintings, writing a book titled “Bullfighting,” working as actor Peter O’Toole’s double in “Lawrence of Arabia,” and guiding author James Michener during research for the book “Iberia,” which then featured Fulton. Born Fulton John Short, he dropped the surname when he discovered Spaniards couldn’t pronounce it, and reversed his first and middle names. Fulton retired from the bullring in 1994 after a final kill in San Miguel de Allende. On Friday in Seville, after a heart attack.