The Huntington
1151 Oxford Road
San Marino, CA 91108
(626) 405-2100
A podcast is available
for this exhibition
 This exhibition has been organized by Tate Britain, London, the National Gallery of Art, Washington, and The Huntington Library, Art Collections, and Botanical Gardens, California.Major underwriting for this exhibition at The Huntington is provided by the Ahmanson Foundation; Daniel Greenberg, Susan Steinhauser, and the Greenberg Foundation; and Heather and Paul Haaga.
Additional support is provided by the Ralph M. Parsons Foundation, the Fletcher Jones Foundation, and the Capital Group Companies Charitable Foundation. |
Constable's Great Landscapes:
The Six-Foot Paintings
Feb. 3, 2007 - April 29, 2007
The MaryLou and George Boone Gallery
In association with Tate Britain, London,
and the National Gallery of Art, Washington
The Huntington is hosting the first exhibition to present all six of John Constable’s monumental six-foot landscape paintings in one place. Considered his masterpieces, these canvases are the largest and most celebrated of the British artist’s works. The series includes such well-known works as The White Horse (1819) and The Hay Wain (1821), as well as The Huntington’s own View on the Stour Near Dedham (1822).
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John Constable, View on the Stour Near Dedham, 1822. Oil on canvas, 51 x 74 inches. The Huntington. |
John Constable, View on the Stour Near Dedham (full-sized sketch), c. 1821. Oil on canvas, 51 x 72 ½ inches. Private Collection. |
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Docent-led tours and Self-guided audio tours are now available for this exhibition. |
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Shown alongside the six grand paintings will be the full-size oil sketches Constable made for them---remarkable works of art in their own right. The artist’s practice of painting preliminary sketches on the same scale as his exhibition pictures has long been viewed as one of his most original contributions to western art. Juxtaposed with their finished exhibition canvases, the full-size sketches reveal the unique creative process Constable developed in order to work on such a substantial scale. Approximately 50 related works round out the show.
Exhibition
"I do not consider myself at work [unless]
I am before
a six-foot canvas"
– Constable to John Fisher, 1821
John Constable, The White Horse, 1819. Oil on canvas, 51 ¾ x 74 inches. The Frick Collection, New York.
Constable's Great Landscapes
This major exhibition offers the first opportunity to view John Constable’s great six-foot exhibition canvases together. The “Six-Footers” are among the best-known images in British art and include such celebrated pictures as The Hay Wain, 1821. They lie at the very heart of Constable’s achievement.
John Constable, The Hay Wain, 1821. Oil on canvas, 51 ¼ x 73 inches. The National Gallery, London.
Constable’s decision to start painting six-foot landscapes marked a significant turning point in his career. He was determined to paint on a larger scale to attract more notice at the Royal Academy exhibitions and to project his ideas about landscape. Extraordinary technical achievements, the “Six-Footers” are also poignant illustrations of Constable’s emotional attachment to the landscape he painted. The artist once said that “painting is but another word for feeling.” For him, the landscape contained powerful autobiographical associations, and painting it became a potent means of psychological expression.
As important as the six-foot exhibition paintings was Constable’s decision to paint related full-scale sketches, which, with their free and vigorous brushwork, were unprecedented at the time. The exhibition unites these sketches with their corresponding finished pictures, affording a unique opportunity to experience these famous works in relationship to each other, and providing viewers extraordinary insights into Constable’s creative process.
Marking Out a Path (1805-1814)
John Constable (1776-1837) grew up in East Bergholt, a village in the Stour River valley of Suffolk County, in the southeast of England. His depictions of the working life along the Stour River became the primary subject matter of this art. Meandering through a rustic countryside, the Stour River had been made navigable for barge traffic in the eighteenth century. Constable was entranced with the bountiful rural landscape of the Stour valley. He frequently painted local views with strong personal associations.
Born to a well-to-do family, Constable’s father expected him to continue in the family’s milling business. However, at the relatively late age of twenty-two Constable was able to convince his father to let him pursue his artistic ambitions. He moved to London to attend the school of the Royal Academy of Art, where he exhibited his first landscape painting in 1802.
Constable also set up a studio in Suffolk, to which he returned each summer to study the natural world of his birthplace. He worked up his drawings and oil studies out-of-doors to capture the dynamic, changing effects of light and nature in flux. Constable continued this plein air (open air) practice throughout his career. As he wrote, “Nature is the fountain’s head, the source from whence all originality must spring.”
I am determined to finish a small picture on the spot for every one I intend to make in future…
John Constable, Flatford Mill from the Lock, c. 1811. Oil on canvas, 10 x 12 inches. The Huntington. (small sketch)
The Open Air Picture (1814-1820)
During his summers in Suffolk, Constable immersed himself in the practice of making small-scale oil sketches out-of-doors, a practice used in Europe since the late eighteenth century. He used these plein-air studies to record nature’s varying temperaments and fleeting effects. Working out-of-doors allowed Constable to capture the patterns of clouds moving across the sky and the changing appearance of light under different weather conditions. The sky became an object of intense interest for him. He later called it “the chief ‘Organ of sentiment.’”
With an inheritance left to him on his father’s death, Constable attained financial security in 1817, enabling him, after many years of courtship, to marry Maria Bicknell, the granddaughter of the rector of East Bergholt. The coupled settled in a London home in Hampstead, had seven children, and a marriage of deep contentment, marked only by Maria’s fragile health.
The Large River Stour Paintings (1819-1825)
Constable’s artistic ambitions came to fruition in the six monumental landscapes of rural scenes in the Stour Valley, which he exhibited at the Royal Academy between 1819 and 1825. The critical success of the first of these six-foot wide paintings, The White Horse, 1819, led to his admission, finally, at the age of 43, into the Royal Academy as an associate member. One of the reasons Constable painted his exhibition landscapes on such a grand scale was to attract the attention of potential patrons at the crowded annual Royal Academy exhibitions, which were a crucial place for establishing an artist’s reputation.
John Constable, View on the Stour Near Dedham, 1822. Oil on canvas, 51 x 74 inches. The Huntington.
To create these large paintings, Constable developed an innovative pictorial process. Beginning with pencil studies and oil sketches, he adopted the unprecedented practice of making a full-scale oil sketch before starting on the final exhibition picture. Although Constable never displayed or sold his full-scale sketches, they are powerful works in their own right. The immediacy, vigor and dynamism of the paint handling in the six-foot oil sketches appeals strongly to modern sensibilities. However, it is important to remember that for Constable they served as a means to an end – the finished exhibition painting. Current exhibition practice called for a high level of “finish,” in which the amount of detail and overall surface effect was more subdued than in the sketch. Shown here alongside their finished exhibition canvases, the full-size sketches reveal Constable’s unique creative process.
Later Six-Foot Landscapes (1827-1837)
In the later 1820s Constable began to paint landscape beyond the Stour Valley, starting with more “inland” scenes in Suffolk, and moving on to sites such as London, Salisbury, and Brighton. He diversified his subject matter to enhance his reputation as more than a regional painter and advance his chances of being elected a full member of the Royal Academy. This change was also due to personal necessity. From 1824, his wife Maria’s increasing illness forced moves with his large family between London, Hampstead, and Brighton until her death from tuberculosis in 1828.
My reputation at home… [is] daily gaining ground, & I deeply feel the honour of having found an original style
John Constable, Salisbury Cathedral from the Meadows. 1831. Oil on canvas, 59 ¾ x 74 ¾ inches. Private Collection.
On Maria’s death Constable wrote that a “void is made in my heart that can never be filled in this world.” The artist’s life thereafter was clouded by his personal grief – anguish evident in the desolate ruins, bleak stormy sky, and thick, turbulent brushwork of later landscapes such as Hadleigh Castle, c.1828-29. Although equally powerful and emotive, Salisbury Cathedral from the Meadows, finished two years later, has often been seen as an expression of renewal and hope.
In 1829 Constable was finally awarded full membership in the Royal Academy, which secured his professional position and reputation. Although he struggled for recognition in his own life time, Constable has become one of the most celebrated of British painters. His great English landscapes ensure his enduring legacy.
The wall paint for this exhibition was made possible through a gift by Farrow & Ball from their collection of colors, which is based on historic English interiors. The colors were selected to bring to mind the backgrounds Constable painted the wall of his lodgings in 1813 for displaying his paintings. The gallery walls are painted Eating Room Red, based on an 1818 color evoking the strong, intense shades favored during the early nineteenth century. The wall text is based on the color Dead Salmon, the name which appears on a paint bill of 1805.
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