Facts about The Hay Wain
- 07
Eugène Delacroix reportedly cited The Hay Wain as an influence on his bold use of colour and loose brushwork in French Romantic painting.
- 06
In 1824, The Hay Wain won a gold medal at the Paris Salon, establishing Constable's international reputation decades before he achieved comparable recognition in his native England.
- 05
Constable painted numerous oil sketches of Flatford Mill and the surrounding landscape between 1810 and 1817, using these studies as direct references when creating The Hay Wain a few years later.
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Constable's composition includes a white horse pulling the hay wain through shallow water, a detail inspired by the daily working practices of Suffolk agricultural laborers during the early 19th century.
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The 1821 painting depicts a rural scene near Suffolk that Constable exhibited at the Royal Academy under the title Landscape, earning a gold medal from the French government the following year.
- 02
Flatford Mill, the water mill depicted in The Hay Wain, was owned by Constable's father and operated as a working grain mill throughout the 19th century.
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John Constable's The Hay Wain, painted in 1821, measures 130 by 185 centimeters and hangs in London's National Gallery.