John Constable 1776-1837 HAMPSTEAD, LOOKING TOWARDS HARROW 1821

1. John Constable 1776-1837 HAMPSTEAD, LOOKING TOWARDS HARROW 1821 For ‘5 o’clock afternoon’ – written by Constable on the back of this painting – the sky is remarkably dark, particularly given that it was August. But it is a remarkably dramatic sky with overlapping bands of clouds like two opposing weather fronts. One band crosses from top right to middle left, the one behind is horizontal. Where they cross in the centre, we see both rain and sun. At the right, the striations of the deep blue clouds find a formal echo in the landscape below.

2. John Constable 1776-1837 THE HAYWAIN 1821 This painting appears in so many waiting rooms in bad prints that it is easy to forget its beauty and subtlety. The nostalgic calm, so effortlessly evoked, convinces us that Constable was showing ‘truth’, not ‘art’ – so it comes as a surprise to learn that this was painted in London, not the countryside. The carefully balanced composition and evidence of the odd change – there was a boy sitting on a barrel to the right of the dog – tell us that Constable had arranged nature, while details such as the mass of trees shielding the distant background signal his indebtedness to Claude.