Cloud study, waiting for the storm behind East Bergholt House.

Always fascinated by cloud formations and the weather, by the early 1820’s Constable began a series of ‘Cloud Studies' in both watercolour and oil, in which he included a margin of land or treetops along the bottom of an image, such as this study from the Donkey Track on the old Heath behind Constable's family home.

Constable, known for his natural tones and vibrant greens to match the everyday colours he saw in the landscape in and around his home of East Bergholt, these classical landscapes  are of vivid colours, painted to give realistic appearance of everyday countryside life.

Golding Constable (the artist's father) worked 94 acres of farm in and around East Bergholt and at Flatford Mill, and the artist often painted farm labourers working in the countryside such as these, his father's tenants shown beating turnip heads over a blanket to collect the oil seeds used to feed livestock, while the figures on the right burn the leftover stems and leaves of the flowers.

Constable portrayed buildings in detail through these series of paintings and sketches of small aspects of architecture and their surroundings around his family home at East Bergholt such as this view through the trees at the back of East Bergholt House at sunset towards West Lodge with the church on the left.

Stacks of hay in a field with the sun setting amid red clouds.

This view towards the west in East Bergholt, home to the Constables and where the artist grew up, this shows the sun setting amid the red clouds in undulating countryside with stacks of hay in the field.

A view of Flatford Lock on the Stour looking towards Bridge Cottage.

This small canvas is said to convey all the brilliance of Constable's full scale masterpieces and depicts a breezy English late summer scene with a distant rainstorm and a sunburst lighting up a field of haystacks.

View of the lock at Flatford

Constable is said to have used ‘a thousand greens’ to capture the complexity of nature's beauty, giving it a sense of drama.
This piece has no inscription and is not signed or dated

A colourful sunset with figures and rooks, looking west from the end of Cemetery Lane in East Bergholt.

It is said that this sketch utilizes a fragment cut from the same canvas as another bearing the date 7 July 1812 but we have not been able to identify that piece.

A view of St Mary's Church from the edge of the village Green.

Constable painted St Mary's Church numerous times over the years.   His father Golding Constable was church warden for thirteen years and the family had its own pew in the middle aisle. The Rector at the time, Dr Rhudde, was the grandfather of Maria Bicknell who went on to become Constable's wife.

A tree lined view of the porch of East Bergholt Church from the South-west.