As paintings go it's quite large. It's a little quiet at work in August so I took advantage of this and had a longer than normal lunch today. Since May there's been an exhibition centred around John Constable's famous painting the Hay Wain, I'd wanted to go but hadn't got around to it, until today. It was a lovely exhibition involving artists who inspired Constable or were influenced by him. In the picture above on the right are test paintings he did of clouds. On the right some lovely small landscapes of his, which I really liked, especially Willy Lott's house, with a 'flying' dog
The Hay Wain itself is stunning. The level of detail is extraordinary. It's a well known image of course but any reproductions don't do the brush work and attention to detail justice. Plus the painting is two centuries old, but still as vibrant as when first painted.
There was one painting though that for me eclipsed the Hay Wain, this extraordinary painting below by David Inshaw. The inspiration for this came from Thomas Hardy's poem After A Journey, penned after Hardy's first wife died. The landscape in the painting is stylised with the female figure almost hovering above the grave. A powerful and evocative painting.
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