John Constable: A Choice for the National Gallery

"Arundel Mill and Castle" by John Constable

"By a law of the Royal Academy, works not before exhibited of a deceased artist, are allowed to appear in the first exhibition, and that one only, which follows his death, and John Constable's picture of 'Arundel Mill and Castle' was considered by his friends sufficiently completed to be sent to the Academy. He had begun two smaller pictures, but they were not forward enough to be admitted even as sketches, and the 'Mill' was, therefore, the only work of his pencil that graced the Exhibition of 1837, the first in Trafalgar Square. The scene was one entirely after his own heart, and he had taken great pains to render it complete in all its details, and in that silvery brightness of effect which was a chief aim with him, in the latter years of his life, it is not surpassed by any production of his pencil. 

Before the property Constable left in pictures was dispersed it was suggested that one of his works should be purchased by a subscription among the admirers of his genius and presented to the National Gallery. He proposed that they large picture of 'Salisbury from the Meadows' should be chosen as being from its magnitude, subject, and grandeur of treatment, the best suited to the public collection. But is was thought by the majority of Constable's friends that the boldness of its execution rendered it less likely to address itself to the general taste than others of its work, and the pictures of 'The Corn Field,' painted in 1826, was selected in its stead."

(Excerpts from "Life and Letters of John Constable, R.A." by Charles Robert Leslie.)