Delacroix

Constable was big in France : Part 2

/ davidrpharmer / Leave a comment

This is the painting that we always think of and this was shown for the first time in Paris in 1824

This became the style that the French referred to as a la Constable, rustic cottages,wagons in ponds and open fields and skies.

In the light of his French success, Constable’s continues determination not to travel abroad seems nothing short of bloody-mindedness if not pure rudeness. In spite of all inducements from Arrowsmith, from his friend Fisher, and even despite his gold medal was about to be presented by King Charles X himself he was adamant about refusing to go to France.He was thrilled with the medal which was later presented to him in London by the French ambassador. But he was resolved not to go to France

“I hope not to go to Paris as long as I live” he said. ” I would rather be a poor man here than a rich man abroad”. Well, be careful what you wish for. All of a sudden, as quickly as it came,Constable’s moment of French fame passed. By the end of 1825 he had fallen out with Arrowsmith. When the French market crashed like the British one during the mid-1820s, Arrowmith and another of Constable’s dealers Claude Scroth, went out of business. Constable’s commercial conduit dried up. He had sold more landscapes in a short space of time than had been bought by British buyers in years, but now the HayWain came back and The Cornfield was sent back from the Louvre in 1827 unsold

And there it is. It is in the National Gallery now

Constable hadn’t been the only successful british Painter at the 1824 salon. In fact so many British painters were showing , that it was known as the Salon des Anglais, which was quite a coup for the national contingent. Two others like Constable were awarded medals, and another made a Chevalier of the Legion d’Honneur. There seemed to be widespread approval of the so-called “British style” in landscape painting. If only Constable had been more amenable to travel and doing some networking he might well have prolonged his popularity. Delacroix for one was anxious to meet him, but although Delacroix came to London in 1825, and met other painters, there is no record of him meeting with Constable. You can’t imagine Turner squandering an opportunity to make such an important relationship. Quite the contrary, Turner went to a lot of trouble to meet Delacroix in Paris, in either 1829 or 1832. The urbane Frenchman was underimpressed with Turner’s appearance. Constable he described as ‘an admirable man…one of the glories of England’. He recorded Turner as looking’like an English farmerwith his rough black coat and heavy boots, and his cold, hard expression’. Later on though we was to concede that both Turner and Constable were the ‘true reformers’ of landscape painting

So on that note, let’s bring Turner bck into the story. Did Turner also fly the flag for the British School in Paris. No he didn’t.

He was conspicuous by his absence. Despite his enthusiasm for European landscape and despite his frequent travels, and the way he reinforced the preeminece of European culture, he was never represented at the Salon.

He rarely exhibited outside of his own country, only on two occasions and both times probably wished he hadn’t. The first was a solo exhibition in Rome in 1828 when reaction to his work was vitriolic to say the least. There was a cartoon going round which said ‘O Charlatan excrement is not art’ ! The second occasion was in Munich in 1845. Turner was the only British artist showing at an exhibition called ‘Congress of European Art’ Again his painting horrified the locals. The Germans were appalled by the loose handling and lack of form and regrettably interpreted this as a satire upon their country. To add insult to injury the picture was returned to Turner damaged , with additional carriage costs to pay. He was furious and apparently fussed over it ‘like a hen in a a fury’

An interestin paradox then in Turner’s relationship with Europe. Despite his extensive travels and his European outlook, his paintings had limited appeal abroad during his lifetime. It was Constable who was the more prominent of the two. To this day, it remains one of the more unlikely developments in Western art history.

Constable was big in France

/ davidrpharmer / 2 Comments

Something I didn’t know until I started reading about him with a view to preparing a talk later this year entitled Turner and Constable. In 1821 when he showed at the Royal Academy and showed The haywain in fact, he was wildly embraced by the French art market, not quite literally although he might have been. he was totally unprepared for all this enthusiasm which he certainly wasn’t used to at home

One of the first to discover him was the French Romanticist Theodor Gericault. He is probably best known for his famous painting The Raft of the Medusa, which he had brought to London, and which we are told thrilled 70,000 Londoners

And this is Gericault’s famous painting, which I will just talk about before talking about Gericault’s reaction to Constable’s work

This painting was based on a real incident which shocked the French nation. The French naval frigate ran aground off the coast of Mauretania on 2 July 1816. At least 150 people were set adrift on a hurriedly constructed raft. Only 15 survived and were picked up. The event fascinated Gericault and he could be said to have hooked into national grief. He undertook extensive research including visiting morgues for the skin colour of the dying and the dead. The painting was shown in the Salon of 1819 and received national approbation. He brought it to London where it thrilled Londoners including one Turner who went back to his studio and reworked his own great work The Shipwreck

Whilst in London Gericault visited the Academy exhibition and there discovered Constable. He thought that The Haywain was the best in the exhibition. Other French visitors thought the same and waxed lyrical.

Much to Constable’s surprise the interest quickly snowballed. A Parisian art dealer called Arrowsmith, French despite his name, offered to buy The Hay Wain and offered a derisory sum. The negotiations broke down but two years later, when Constable was short of money, he agreed to sell the painting to Arrowsmith for £250, as well as other pieces. The paintings caused a stir when they arrived in Paris.

The arrival of the Hay wain in 1824 was like a pebble dropping in a Parisian mill pond. The effect was immediate. At the epi-centre of the quake was another influential figure, Eugene Delacroix, who was so influened by the Hay Wain that he went back to his studio and repainted background on his great work The Massacre at Chios. He was blown away by Constable’s greens and tried to copy them. Critics viewing this picture at the time couldn’t find much evidence of green being used, but there we are.

If Delacroix was talking about the Hay Wain, then others were bound to be listening. A few weeks later it was these two paintings which received the greatest share of the attention at the Academie des Beaux-Arts, known as the Salon. The Salon dominated taste and opinion in France to an even greater extent than the Academy in Britain

Constable was embraced at the Salon in a way that had never happened to him at home. His large paintings were removed to positions of prominence, and Monsieur Constable, Peintre de Paysage was awarded a gold medal of excellence. His friend John Fisher couldn’t resist commenting that plain old Constable, who didn’t speak a word of French, was the talk and admiration of the French. His name entered the language. Landscapes were described as a la Constable!. More French exhibitions followed in Lille including another gold medal, Douai and the Salon again in1827, where there were plenty of landscapes a la Constable, with rustic cottages, wagons in ponds and open fields and skies.

Constable nevertheless refused to visit France, his attitude seemingly bloody-minded bordering on rude.

This is probably a good place to take a break. We are about half way, so a lot of writing and a lot of reading for you guys. It will take another post to complete the subject which I will do soonest