John Constable R.A. 1776-1837

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Description

John Constable
Boys fishing on the River Stour
oil on canvas

Provenance

By descent to Isabel Constable, who died 1888;
Ella Mackinnon, nee Constable, by whom probably sold, Christie’s, 28 May 1891 or 17 June 1892;
Francis Gibson, by whom probably acquired at the above sale, and by descent to Lewis Fry;
Mrs Hugo Mallet;
Anon. sale, Christie’s, 21 November 1980, lot 69 where acquired by the present owner

Exhibited

Grosvenor Gallery, A Century of British Art, 1889, no.293;
Milwaulkee, University of Wisconsin, Constable, 1976, no.17;
Tate Gallery, Constable, 1991, no.55

Literature

Andrew Shirley, Mezzotints by David Lucas after Constable, 1930, p.179, Plate XX;
Andrew Shirley, Memoirs of the Life of John Constable, R.A., 1937, pp.62 and 77;
Robert Hoozee, ' Constable's "Lock on the Stour" ', Connoisseur, Vol.CXCI, 1976, p.107;
Robert Hoozee, L'Opera Completa di Constable, 1979, no.173, Pl.X;
Graham Reynolds, The Early Paintings and Drawings of John Constable, 1996, Text Volume, no.13.3, Plates Volume Pl.993

Catalogue Note

This fresh and vibrant open air sketch shows the River Stour with Flatford Lock on the right and looks upstream to the footbridge and Bridge Cottage. It is one of a small group of studies for the picture entitled Landscape: Boys fishing, which Constable exhibited at the Royal Academy in 1813, and which he showed in 1814 at the British Institution with the title Landscape: a Lock on the Stour.

The finished picture which Constable exhibited in 1813 was, with the exception of an untraced Lake District Landscape, the largest landscape so far painted by the artist. It received great praise from the critics, and was later engraved by David Lucas as part of his English Landscape series. Graham Reynolds (op. cit.) records four oil studies for this composition, as well as two related drawings.

The area around Flatford Mill continued to be a source of many of Constable’s important paintings. Willy Lott’s House, to the south-east of Flatford Mill, formed the setting for The White Horse (Frick Collection, New York) The Hay Wain (National Gallery, London) and The Valley Farm (Tate Gallery). In 1815 he exhibited Boat Building (Victoria and Albert Museum) showing his father’s boatyard upstream from Flatford Mill.

Flatford Mill was at the centre of his family business, and Constable’s early paintings focus on depictions of this area. In his correspondence with John Fisher Constable remarks that the River Stour and its surroundings “made me a painter (& I am grateful) that is I had often thought of pictures of them before I had ever touched a pencil.” (R.B. Beckett, Ed., John Constable’s Correspondence, Vol. VI, 1968, pp.77-78).