Sketch for "The Hay Wain"
John Constable
ca. 1820
The Hay Wain is Constable’s best-known painting and was acquired for the National Gallery, London. It came to life as a series of open-air sketches, in which a wain, or wagon, trundles through a shallow mill pond in Flatford. This preparatory sketch, with its gestural rendering of the scene and textured clouds above, is believed to have been made in Constable’s London studio. It is remarkable for its painterly economy, containing nearly all thecompositional elements of the six-foot painting in its small format.
Yale Center for British Art, New Haven · Image: Yale Center for British Art, Public domain · Text: Yale Center for British Art, CC0