Focus painting
March Focus: Homelands
The landscape around the River Stour in Suffolk was central to Constable’s ‘careless boyhood’ and his artistic career.
This painting is the second of Constable’s ‘six-footer’ canvases representing scenes around the area. It helped to cement Constable’s reputation as a landscape painter, and was exhibited at the Royal Academy.
The view looks towards Stratford Mill along the river and appears to be an accurate depiction of what was before the painter’s eyes. Constable was later to write:
‘The sound of water escaping from mills, dams, willows, old rotten planks, slimy posts and brickwork. I love such things. These scenes made me a painter.’
Almost all of these things are included in his painting, and his sketchbooks contain studies from life of the timber in the foreground. However, the work was made in his studio. We are left with a question – was Constable’s landscape simply a rendering of observed reality or did Constable’s memories and morals help to shape this rural scene?
More paintings from the collection
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See also
- Talks and events on homelands
- Talks on John Constable, 'Stratford Mill'
- Free art: download this month's focus painting
