Oil sketch, 'Study of Clouds and trees', John Constable, British School, 1821-2

Study of clouds and trees - low horizon with dark green scrub and trees. Sky cloudy, blue with bright white clouds.

Given by Isabel Constable

One of a group of cloud studies that he executed at Hampstead in years 1821-2. They depict the sky at a particular moment in time, and under certain weather conditions, just as a portrait-painter might try and capture some fleeting but particularly characteristic expression on a sitter's face. Often these studies are annotated with precise details of the time and weather conditions in which they were painted.

Given by Isabel Constable, 1888

The chief of Constable’s four exhibits in 1821 was ‘Landscape: Noon’ (‘The Hay Wain’) (National Gallery No. 1207; for the full-scale sketch see No. 209 [987-1900] in this Catalogue). His third child, Charles Golding Constable, was born on 29 March. He accompanied Archdeacon John Fisher on his visitation of Berkshire in June, took No. 2 Lower Terrace, Hampstead, for his family during the summer and autumn and paid a visit to Fisher at Salisbury in November.

[G Reynolds, 1973, p. 135]

Constable's interest in landscape painting was a deeply felt response to the beauty and variety of nature. 'Painting is with me but another word for feeling' he told his friend John Fisher. Yet he saw the process by which he translated his vision into two dimensions as essentially scientific. 'In such an age as this', he wrote, 'painting should be understood, not looked on with blind wonder, not considered only as a poetic aspiration, but as a pursuit, legitimate, scientific and mechanical.'

162-1888