Constable
Selection by Lucian Freud

        10 October 2002 - 13 January 2003

        Organised jointly by the Réunion des Musées Nationaux and the British Council.

        Constable was born in 1776 in East Bergholt in Suffolk, about fifty kilometres from London, and spent most of his life in his native region - London, Salisbury and Brighton. A trip to the Lake District in Northern England was the only exception in a particularly sedentary life. He drew the subjects of his paintings from this area and a critic justly remarked that Constable’s work reflected his exclusive passion for a few landscapes.

        Yet there was nothing settled or easy about Constable’s life. Certainly, he was born into the family of a prosperous corn merchant and spent part of his youth working in the family business. He became familiar with the countryside, both through observation and by actively working in it. He managed to persuade his father to let him paint and after a few lessons with local artists, he set off for London in 1799 to study at the Royal Academy School. He first exhibited in the Royal Academy exhibition in 1802, but for many years his paintings met with little success and the few he managed to sell went to friends such as the Fishers, a very supportive Salisbury family.

        In 1816, he married Maria Bicknell, in a late but happy union that was cut short by Maria’s death in 1828. During these years, Constable’s wife and children provided the comfort he needed to counteract the hardships of his career in the art world.

        Success came at last in the 1820s, although it was only relative compared with that enjoyed by Turner in the same period. It was confirmed only after the triumphant reception of his exhibition in Paris. His tardy recognition was partly due to his unbending standards. Seldom has a painter conceded so little to critics and the public. His life was strictly limited to his work, his family and a few friends.

        Returning time and again to the same subjects in an attempt to render minute variations of weather on the scenery - sixty years before the Impressionists - he literally revolutionised landscape painting in Europe. His insistence on truth and refusal to use facile, charming effects were a real shock for his contemporaries. He was compared to a mirror which reflects truth along with its defects. The attention he gave clouds and changes in the sky show not only the preoccupations of his time but also a stubborn determination to render the beauties of nature with scientific accuracy. His work marked the end of historical and mythological references and of the great tradition of Poussin and Claude Lorrain. Constable’s influence on European painting was immense, and the Barbizon painters, Paul Huet and Théodore Rousseau in particular, owed him a heavy debt.

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        This is a long awaited exhibition. The artist whom Delacroix called "the father of our landscape school" has never been the subject of a major retrospective in France. Such an oversight is all the harder to understand in that the French have always appreciated Constable, even if there are very few of his works in French museums.

        The result of close cooperation between France and England, the exhibition was designed in a most original way. The great British painter Lucian Freud, who has long been passionately interested in Constable’s work, selected the paintings and drawings presented at the Galeries Nationales du Grand Palais (and gave the interview about Constable which prefaces the catalogue). Lucian Freud, who was born in Berlin in 1922 and belonged to the same generation as his friend Francis Bacon, is one of the most fascinating artists of the second half of the twentieth century. Alongside the masterpieces which obviously must be included in this type of retrospective exhibition, Lucian Freud has chosen works which shed light on neglected or lesser known aspects of Constable’s works. Thus in addition to the great landscapes which made the artist’s name (The Hay Wain, View on the Stour near Dedham, The Cenotaph, several versions of Salisbury Cathedral), visitors will find the most extensive set of portraits and drawings that has ever been shown outside the English-speaking world. The exhibition brings together the major finished paintings, several large sketches which show how the artist worked, small sketches done in the open air, drawings and watercolours. The world’s greatest museums and many private collectors, including David Thomson, the greatest living collector of Constable’s works, have lent their masterpieces to this exhibition.

Galeries nationales du Grand Palais
Clémenceau entrance, 75008 Paris
Information: 01 44 13 17 17

Hours
Open every day, except Tuesdays, from 10 a.m. to 8 p.m. (no tickets sold after 7.15 p.m.),
Wednesdays from 10 a.m. to 10 p.m. (no tickets sold after 9.15 p.m.). Closed on 25 December.

Admission
• From 10 a.m. to 1 p.m. with bookings: full price Euros 9.1, concessions on Mondays only: Euros 6.6.
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Group Ticket Sales (20 tickets and over, for use in the afternoon only):
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Sésame Card
A season ticket issued by the Galeries nationales du Grand Palais for the 3 exhibitions in the 2002/2003 season.
Three types of card are available:
Sésame duo Euros 60, (unlimited number of visits for two people),
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Special rates for a group purchase of 10 Sesame cards:
Sésame duo Euros 50;
Sésame solo Euros 27.
Information available at the Grand Palais or by telephone 01 44 13 17 47.

Audioguide: Euros 5

Group tours
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Galeries nationales du Grand Palais
3, avenue du Général Eisenhower
75008 Paris

Information: 01 44 13 17 10
Fax: 01 44 13 17 60
Minitel: 3611 "Galeries nationales"

Access
• Metro: lines 1, 9 and 13: stations Champs-Elysées-Clemenceau or Franklin-Roosevelt.
• Bus: lines 28, 32, 42, 49, 72, 73, 80, 83, 93.