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Study of Foliage

Oil Painting
ca. 1828 (painted)
Artist/Maker
Place of origin

Constable made studies like this throughout his career. He advised a visitor to his studio, 'never do anything without nature before you...See those weeds and the dock leaves?...I should not attempt to introduce them into a picture without having them before me'. Similar clumps of weeds appear in the foreground of various large paintings.


Object details

Categories
Object type
TitleStudy of Foliage (popular title)
Materials and techniques
oil on paper
Brief description
Oil painting, 'Study of Foliage', John Constable, ca. 1828
Physical description
Study of foliage with a very large, centralized leaf.
Dimensions
  • Estimate height: 152mm
  • Estimate width: 242mm
  • Frame height: 45cm (frame for LNO278 Constable in Brighton)
  • Frame width: 50cm (frame for LNO278 Constable in Brighton)
  • Frame depth: 4cm (frame for LNO278 Constable in Brighton)
41.9 x 57.1 x 4 cm: frame for Making of a Master, 2014 45.3 x 50 x 4 cm: frame for LNO278 Constable in Brighton
Style
Marks and inscriptions
'JC' (Inscribed in ink on the back of the sketch)
Credit line
Given by Isabel Constable
Object history
Given by Isabel Constable, 1888
Historical context
'Constable was elected R.A. on 10 February 1829. He exhibited 'Hadleigh Castle' (now in the collection of Mr. and Mrs. Paul Mellon; see No. 127 [D.234-1888] in this Catalogue) and a landscape of a "rich cottage". He paid his last two visits to Fisher at Salisbury, in July and in November. His preparations for English Landscape Scenery got under way in this year: the earliest letter on the subject to Lucas printed by Shirley (S.: L., p. 20) is dated 28 August 1829.'

[G Reynolds, 1973, p.190]
Subject depicted
Summary
Constable made studies like this throughout his career. He advised a visitor to his studio, 'never do anything without nature before you...See those weeds and the dock leaves?...I should not attempt to introduce them into a picture without having them before me'. Similar clumps of weeds appear in the foreground of various large paintings.
Bibliographic references
  • Catalogue of the Constable Collection, Graham Reynolds, Victoria and Albert Museum, London: HMSO, 1973, pp. 190, 197
  • p. 79 Shân Lancaster, ed. Constable and Brighton: something out of nothing. London : Scala Arts & Heritage Publishers Ltd, 2017. ISBN: 9781785510694.
Other number
326, plate 243 - Reynolds catalogue 1996
Collection
Accession number
338-1888

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Record createdJuly 25, 2003
Record URL
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