One prominent English landscape
painter was John Constable. He wanted to
paint the sky, meadows, hills, and streams as the eye actually sees them. To produce this realistic recreation of what
he saw, he kept a small sketchbook during his walks through the fields. His paintings of countryside landscapes are
colorful, calm, and peacefully inviting.
A popular painter during his time, he was commissioned by several
patrons to produce artworks representing their own estates. One such patron, his father's friend, asked
him to paint his estate at Wivenhoe Park, in Essex. Constable's own vision of the estate was
painted like so.
You can hardly even see the estate;
it's all about the natural, pastoral landscape around the house. Half of the entire canvas is just
clouds! This fixation on the beauty and
perfection of nature is a very Romantic concept; and while it was readily
accepted by many, some on the more traditional side still would have preferred
to see the estate. Which do you like
better: looking at the house or the natural setting around it?
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