John Constable

The Hay Wain — English landscape painting

The painter who made the English countryside a subject worthy of the highest art. His six-foot canvases of the Stour valley — painted with a freshness of observation that stunned Delacroix when shown in Paris — are the foundation of plein-air landscape painting.

Key works

• The Hay Wain1821— Flatford Mill — the most English painting
  National Gallery, London
• Salisbury Cathedral from the Meadows1831— The rainbow — nature's cathedral beside man's
  Victoria and Albert Museum, London / Frick Collection, New York

Connections

External