Eye for Art: Focusing on Great Artists and Their Work
chapter one studying nature Slowing down to look closely at nature is an art By examining the colors and shapes of birds or flowers observing the effects of light at different moments or noticing the ways a landscape can change over time artists find inspiration in the natural world This chapter introduces artists who are captivated by nature and study it closely John Constable depicted his native English countryside with fresh attention to atmosphere Martin Johnson Heade and John James Audubon traveled widely to document birds in their natural habitats Claude Monet cultivated his private gardens as subjects to contemplate painting them in changing seasons Georgia O’Keeffe found beautiful abstractions in the details of a single flower Andy Goldsworthy uses natural materials to create sculptures that often become part of nature As you study the different artists in this chapter think about how artists help us see the natural world in new ways
John Constable
I should paint my own places best John Constable 1 Constable’s Country John Constable 1776 1837 was born in East Bergholt a village nestled in the Stour River valley of Suffolk County in southeast England He spent most of his career painting scenes of his native countryside Dotted with cottages farms and mills the rustic landscape along the river captured his imagination His father a prosperous mill owner and coal merchant encouraged him to join the family business but Con stable was interested in painting After seven years he was finally able to persuade his father to allow him to pursue a career in art At the age of twenty-two Constable went to London and enrolled in the school of the Royal Academy the leading British art institution There he studied the landscapes of past masters Titian Peter Paul Rubens Jacob van Ruisdael and Claude Lorrain but he soon decided that he should paint directly from nature Returning home to Suffolk each summer Constable made drawings in the meadows he had known since childhood Through the close observation of nature he developed a fresh approach to landscape painting by capturing the effects of light shadow and atmosphere 2 Wivenhoe Park Major General Francis Rebow a family friend asked Constable to paint his country estate Wivenhoe Park Constable placed the house in the far center of the com position and featured the estate’s park and pasture in the foreground Look for a flock of birds flying above the elm trees swans and ducks gliding across the pond fishermen casting their net from a boat and cows graz ing or resting along the shady bank On the far left General Rebow’s young daughter drives a donkey cart Painting mostly outside Constable captured the radi ance of a summer day with naturalistic details Covering half the canvas with a bright sky Constable carefully considered how the billowing clouds interact with the landscape he painted the pattern of shadows cast by the clouds upon the estate the play of light over the landscape and the reflections of sky and trees in the water above John Constable Self Portrait detail c 1799 1804 pencil and black chalk heightened with white and red chalk National Portrait Gallery London right John Constable Wiven hoe Park Essex 1816 oil on canvas National Gallery of Art Widener Collection 4 Studying Nature
top sketch John Constable The White Horse 1818 1819 oil on canvas National Gallery of Art Widener Collection bottom John Constable The White Horse 1819 oil on canvas The Frick Collection New York Purchase 3 The Six-Footers Working in his London studio from 1818 to 1825 Constable completed a series of scenes of everyday working life along the Stour River He painted from his memories and earlier drawings and he called the paintings six-footers because each canvas was approx imately six by four feet in size The White Horse his first six-footer shows a barge transporting a horse across the river Using poles the men work hard to push the barge to the opposite bank where the horse’s path continues These grand paintings of rustic country scenes attracted positive attention at annual exhibitions and helped Constable achieve recognition as an artist Painting on such a large scale proved challenging so Constable developed a unique approach to creating the six-footers He first made full-scale sketches in oil on canvas that allowed him to try out his ideas and experi ment with painting techniques Since a six-footer took months to complete Constable used his sketches as a way to plan the composition and determine how to arrange buildings people and animals in the landscape Compare the sketch of The White Horse to the finished paint ing Where are the similarities What are some differences Constable often painted sketches with looser more spontaneous brushstrokes and thicker paint while his finished paintings have a smoother surface and include more details Look for places where Constable made changes by adding removing or rearranging things I do not consider myself at work unless I am before a six-foot canvas John Constable 5 Studying Nature 4 Legacy Unlike many of his contemporaries including the British artist J M W Turner Constable never traveled outside of England Throughout his life he remained inspired by the landscapes and places he knew and loved recording both his direct observations of nature and his personal responses to it Constable’s paintings however did leave England Some of his six-footers were exhibited in Paris where their expressive brush work and atmospheric effects influenced French artists Théodore Gericault and Eugène Delacroix and later the young impressionists
