Salisbury Cathedral from the Meadows: The Rainbow

In the late 1820s Constable began collaborating with the engraver David Lucas on a series of mezzotints after his finished paintings and sketches. Between 1830–32 a set of these prints known as English Landscape was published. Around 1832, Lucas began working on a few larger mezzotints, this being the largest. The print is based on Constable’s 1831 Royal Academy exhibit, Salisbury Cathedral from the Meadows. The cathedral at Salisbury was a subject of great personal significance for Constable, as he was close friends with Bishop John Fisher and his nephew Archdeacon John Fisher. He painted it on numerous occasions, the skies becoming darker and more turbulent with successive bereavements. For Constable, mezzotint was an ideal printmaking technique as it could replicate the dramatic range of light and shade of his paintings, known as chiaroscuro. This print is a progress proof that Constable has touched in pencil, chalk and grey wash to suggest changes. He has even added some small pieces of paper to the post in the left-hand foreground.

The Constable Family