8 1/2 x 7 1/8 ins
In 1833 Constable was asked by a Mr John Martin to illustrate an edition of Gray’s Elegy which he was preparing. Constable refers to this commission in a letter to his biographer Leslie on 16th August 1833 when, much depressed by the loss of an old friend, he wrote: To quote a line of that elegy which I am endeavouring to illustrate – The world is left to darkness and to me.
Three of Constable’s illustrations were included in the first edition of Martin’s book published in 1834. Constable did not attempt to be topographically accurate. The church at Stoke Poges is exceptional in having its tower in the middle but the artist has portrayed the type of village church with which he was most familiar.
This watercolour differs from the study in the Victoria & Albert Museum in which the church is shown with its spire. The mood of the Elegy and Constable’s own state of mind dominate these and the two watercolours in the British Museum which both show a figure in contemplation by the side of the church.
In the spring of 1834 Constable, having been too ill to paint any major work for the spring exhibition at the Royal Academy, exhibited two watercolours for the Elegy. These have since disappeared. In the catalogue one was described as Stoke Poges Church near Windsor, the scene of Gray’s Elegy, also where he was buried – In this neglected spot is laid a heart once pregnant with celestial fire.
In 1833 Constable was asked by a Mr John Martin to illustrate an edition of Gray’s Elegy which he was preparing. Constable refers to this commission in a letter to his biographer Leslie on 16th August 1833 when, much depressed by the loss of an old friend, he wrote: To quote a line of that elegy which I am endeavouring to illustrate – The world is left to darkness and to me.
Three of Constable’s illustrations were included in the first edition of Martin’s book published in 1834. Constable did not attempt to be topographically accurate. The church at Stoke Poges is exceptional in having its tower in the middle but the artist has portrayed the type of village church with which he was most familiar.
This watercolour differs from the study in the Victoria & Albert Museum in which the church is shown with its spire. The mood of the Elegy and Constable’s own state of mind dominate these and the two watercolours in the British Museum which both show a figure in contemplation by the side of the church.
In the spring of 1834 Constable, having been too ill to paint any major work for the spring exhibition at the Royal Academy, exhibited two watercolours for the Elegy. These have since disappeared. In the catalogue one was described as Stoke Poges Church near Windsor, the scene of Gray’s Elegy, also where he was buried – In this neglected spot is laid a heart once pregnant with celestial fire.