John Constable
John Constable
John Constable, RAwas an English Romantic painter. Born in Suffolk, he is known principally for his landscape paintings of Dedham Vale, the area surrounding his home—now known as "Constable Country"—which he invested with an intensity of affection. "I should paint my own places best", he wrote to his friend John Fisher in 1821, "painting is but another word for feeling"...
NationalityEnglish
ProfessionArtist
Date of Birth11 June 1776
eye soul mind
It is the soul that sees; the outward eyes Present the object, but the Mind descries. We see nothing till we truly understand it.
education artist self
An artist who is self-taught is taught by a very ignorant person indeed.
paint airy steam
Turner has outdone himself; he seems to paint with tinted steam, so evanescent and so airy.
horse lying grateful
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.
beauty beautiful ugly-things
I never saw an ugly thing in my life: for let the form of an object be what it may - light, shade, and perspective will always make it beautiful.
We see nothing till we truly understand it.
mind drink states
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.
thinking mind trying
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.
men imagination mistress
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.
mother essence light
My picture [A Boat Passing a Lock, 1823-6] is liked at the [Royal] Academy, indeed it forms a decided feature and its light can not be put out. Because it is the light of nature - the Mother of all that is valuable in poetry - painting or anything else... my execution annoys most of them and all the scholastic ones - perhaps the scarifies I make for 'lightness' and 'brightness' is too much but these things are the essence of Landscape.
art light yellow
When we speak of the perfection of art, we must recollect what the materials are with which a painter contends with nature. For the light of the sun he has but patent yellow and white lead - for the darkest shade, umber or soot.
art names first-impression
The first impression and a natural one is, that the fine arts have risen or declined in proportion as patronage has been given to them or withdrawn, but it will be found that there has often been more money lavished on them in their worst periods than in their best, and that the highest honours have frequently been bestowed on artists whose names are scarcely now known.
men able different
No man who can do any one thing well will be able to any different thing equally well.
art imitation court
My art flatters nobody by imitation, it courts nobody by smoothness, nobody by petitelieness without either fal-de-lal or fiddle-de-dee; how then can I hope to be popular?