‘Discover Constable & The Hay Wain’
National Gallery, London, 17 October 2024–2 February 2025
Robin Simon
1 The Hay Wain by John Constable (1776–1837), 1821. Oil on canvas, 130.2 x 185.4 cm. National Gallery
While the queues lengthened for the magnificent Van Gogh exhibition at the National Gallery (Van Gogh: Poets and Lovers’, 14 September 2024–19 January 2025), which was packed with unfamiliar canvases in superb condition, free entry to the main galleries allowed even the casual visitor to enjoy an exploration of Constable’s Hay Wain (Pl 1). This exhibition featured sketches and studies, including the full-size oil study which Constable always prepared for his ‘six-footers’, as well as a few striking examples of works by his contemporaries, notably a well-chosen little landscape by Bonington (Pl 2).
2 A wooded lane by Richard Parkes Bonington (1802–1828), c1825. Oil on millboard, 27.9 x 22. 9 cm. Yale Center for British Art, Paul Mellon Collection
The Hay Wain is quite rightly celebrated for having won a gold medal at the Paris Salon of 1824, an achievement that really did change the course and status of French landscape painting. It was therefore a special treat actually to see the gold medal in question (Pl 3) and also to see recreations of the copies of each side of the medal once more in the frame where they were inserted by an early owner (Pl 4).
3 Gold medal awarded to John Constable in the Paris Salon in 1824. National Gallery
4 Frame of The Hay Wain with modern copies of each side of the gold medal (see Pl 3) inserted in the manner of an earlier owner of the painting
This show also touched upon the ‘after-life’ of The Hay Wain, cliché of the chocolate box, notably with a droll cartoon foreshadowing Osbert Lancaster’s Drayneflete Revealed, ‘If John Constable Lived Today’ from the Daily Express (Lancaster’s paper from 1938) of 2 March 1929 (Pl 5).
5 ‘If John Constable Lived Today’, Daily Express, 2 March 1929
More exhibitions in the excellent ‘Discover’ series are planned.