John Constable (1776 – 1837)
English Romantic painter.
Still I should paint my own places best; painting is with me but another word for feeling, and I associate "my careless boyhood" with all that lies on the banks of the Stour; those scenes made me a painter, and I am grateful; that is, I had often thought of pictures of them before ever I touched a pencil, and your picture ['The White Horse'] is one of the strongest instance I can recollect of it.
We must bear in recollection that the sentiment of the picture is that of solemnity, not gaiety & nothing garish, but the contrary yet it must be bright, clear, alive fresh, and all the front seen.
I ought to respect myself for my friends' sake, and my children's. It is time, at fifty-six, to begin, at least, to know oneself, and I do know what I am not, and your regard for me has at least awakened me to believe in the possibility that I may yet make some impression with my "light" my "dews" my "breezes" my bloom and freshness, no one of which qualities has yet been perfected on the canvas of any painter in the world.
And however one's mind may be elevated, and kept us to what is excellent, by the works of the Great Masters still Nature is the fountain's head, the source from whence all originally must spring and should an artist continue his practice without referring to nature he must soon form a manner, & be reduced to the same deplorable situation as the French painter mentioned by Sir J. Reynolds, who told him that he had long ceased to look at nature for she only put him out.
I am going on very well with my pictures... the park (Wivenhoe Park) is the most forward the great difficulty has been to get so much in as they wanted to make them acquainted with the scene on my left is a grotto with some elms at the head of a piece of water in the centre is the house over a beautifull wood and very far to the right is a Deer House what it was necessary to add. So that my view comprehended to many degrees but to day I got over the difficulty and I begin to like it 'myself'... I live in the park and mrs Rebow says I am very unsociable.
I have added some ploughmen to the landscape form the park pales which is a great help, but I must try and warm the picture a little more if I can... but I look to do a great deal better in future. I am determined to finish a small picture in the spot for every one I intend to make in future. But this I have always talked about but never yet done I think however my mind is more settled and determined than ever on this point.
Our little drawing Room commands a view unequalled in Europe from Westminster Abbey to Gravesend the dome of St Paul's in the Air realizes Michael Angelo's Idea on seeing that of the Pantheon 'I will build such a thing in the Sky.'
It is always my endeavour however in making a picture that it should be without a companion in the world. At least such should be a painters ambition.
My friend Bonner has just set off to Charlotte Street to pack your picture (an old painting) and forward it; it is a beautiful representation of a summers evening; calm, warm and delicious; the colour on the mans face is perfect sunshine. The liquid pencil of this school is replete with a beauty peculiar to itself. Nevertheless, I dont believe they had any 'nostrums,' but plain linseed oil; 'honest linseed' as old Wilson called it. But it is always right to remember that the ordinary painters of that day used, as now, the same vehicle as their betters, and also that their works have all received the hardening and enamelling effects of time, so that we must not judge of originality by these signs always.
Speaking to a lawyer about pictures is something like talking to a butcher about humanity.
Only think that I am now writing in a room full of Claudes... almost of the summit of my earthly ambitions.
The climax of absurdity to which the art may be carried, when led away from nature by fashion, may be best seen in the works of Boucher... His landscape, of which he was evidently fond, is pastoral; and such pastorality! the pastoral of the Opera house.
Sept. 6 th, 1822, looking S.E. 12 to 1 oclock, fresh and bright, between showers much the look of rain all the morning, but very fine and grand all the afternoon and evening.
But the sound of water escaping from mill-dams, &c., willows, old rotten planks, slimy posts, and brickwork, I love such things. Shakespeare could make everything poetical; he tells us of poor Tom's haunts among "sheep cotes and mills." As long as I do paint, I shall never cease to paint such places. They have always been my delight.
Without any doubt the great works of Constable were done at the point when his desire to be a "natural" painter and his need to express his restless, passionate character overlap. Through his violence of feeling, concealed under a conventional exterior, he was able to revolutionise our own feelings about our surroundings. The conviction that open spaces and areas of rural scenery must be saved for the refreshment of our spirits owes more to Constable than to any other artist. While Turner, with greater gifts, was transforming the "beauty spots" of Europe, Constable was teaching us all to realise that our own countryside could be taken exactly as it is, and and yet become more precious to us.
Constable himself knew the value of such studies, for he rarely parted with them. He used to say of his studies and pictures that he had no objection to part with the corn, but not with the field that grew it.
We see nothing truly till we understand it.
A self-taught painter is one taught by a very ignorant person.
But You know Landscape is my mistress 'tis to her that I look for fame and all that the warmth of the imagination renders dear to Man.
A sketch will not serve more than one state of mind & will not serve to drink at again & again in a sketch there is nothing but the one state of mind that which you were in at the time.