John Constable Animal Prints

Mezzotint by David Lucas (1802 - 1881) after the painting by John Constable. Shirley catalog 3 state 6.iv. Christopher Lennox-Boyd state vi/vi. London: Republished Feb.y 15, 1853, by Thomas Boys (of the late Firm of Moon, Boyd & Greaves,) Printseller to the Royal Family, 467, Oxford Street - Paris. E.Gambart & C. 9 Rue d'Orleans au Marais,-Depose. Originally Published July 1.1834. Image 22 1/4 x 19 1/2, plate 26 3/4 x 20 3/8, sheet 30 3/4 x 24 3/8. A rich impression printed on sturdy wove paper with full margins, mounted on archival paper. A few unobtrusive scrapes and folds, one horizontally across the center of the image, and a faint water stain in the top right-hand image and margin. Signed in the plate. Housed in a double archival mat and a Hogarth 36.50 x 30.50 x 1.25-inch Hogarth frame with gilded corner ornaments. ------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------- The Cornfield depicts Fen lane as it leads from East Bergholt towards Dedham; a village in the borough of Colchester. A flock of sheep are followed by a dog as the path winds towards figures active in a cornfield. A boy, prone and with his face on the surface of a stream, slakes his thirst. The church in the distance is thought to have been an invention on Constable's part. --------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------- First exhibited at the Royal Academy in 1826, Constable's The Cornfield became one of the artist's most celebrated works. It was reproduced in mezzotint by David Lucas in 1834 and sold by J. McLean and Hodgson, Boys and Graves, and Rudolph Ackermann. This print, however, derives from a posthumous collection of Constable's works entitled 'English Landscape Scenery,' edited by H.G. Bohn and published by Thomas Boys in 1853. The series consisted of forty mezzotint engravings on steel plates; all of which were produced by Lucas. ---------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------- The Cornfield is one of Constable’s best-known works. It was also the first of his pictures to enter a public collection. Shortly after his death in 1837, a committee was set up to subscribe towards the purchase of a painting for the nation, and The Cornfield was bought for the National Gallery for 300 guineas. The list of subscribers included the poet William Wordsworth, the scientist Michael Faraday...