Burgh House, London
If you thought that Constable was all rainbows and sunshine, some mezzotints he commissioned show intriguing new depths
John Constable never left England. So much of how he painted and thought about the world can be explained by this basic fact. In 1803, aged 26, he went on a trip along the Kent coast – the closest he would get to going abroad – with the enthusiasm of a man stepping foot for the first time in the new world. “I saw all sorts of weather”, he wrote. “Some the most delightful, and some as melancholy.”
This trip was an exception. For most of his life he moved between three points: Suffolk, Hampstead and Brighton. While his great rival JMW Turner, one year his senior, travelled across France and Italy, Constable took pleasure in being parochial. “I am sure you will laugh”, he told his wife, Maria, but “I have found another very promising subject at Flatford Mill”.
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Burgh House, LondonIf you thought that Constable was all rainbows and sunshine, some mezzotints he commissioned show intriguing new depthsJohn Constable never left England. So much of how he painted and thought about...
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