National Gallery of Australia | Audio Tour | Constable

Constable first achieved success (and recognition by the Royal Academy) with his large canvases depicting the Stour Valley, which he exhibited between 1819 and 1825. Working on a scale usually reserved for History painting, Constable redefined the notion of a ‘finished’ picture by giving his large paintings something of the spontaneous freedom and expressive handling of a rapidly painted sketch. During the 1820s Constable was repeatedly occupied with the motif of the Lock – it could be regarded as his favourite subject. In 1824 he exhibited the fifth in his series of six large Stour Valley paintings at the Royal Academy, ‘A boat passing a lock’, which he subsequently called The lock (Carmen Thyssen-Bornemisza Collection on loan to the Museo Thyssen-Bornemisza, Madrid). It differed from the previous four large canvases in having a vertical format. Constable made at least two other upright versions of the subject in 1824 (Philadelphia Museum and Art Gallery, and private collection). Then, in this painting, he