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拍品專文
The subject of the present recently re-discovered drawing is taken from Act II, scene I of Shakespeare's As you Like it and shows the melancholy courtier
'as he lay along
Under an oak whose antique root peeps out
Upon the brook that brawls along this wood:
To the which place a poor sequester'd stag,
That from the hunter's aim had ta'en a hurt,
Did come to languish,
...the melancholy Jaques,
Stood on the extremest verge of the swift brook',
As You Like It was both Constable and his friend and patron Sir George Beaumont's favourite play and Constable in particular appears to have sympathised with the character of Jaques. In about 1819, Beaumont produced an oil of the subject (now in the Tate, London) which must have further inspired Constable to explore the subject. He appears to have worked on this subject on at least two occasions: the first sometime between the late 1820s and before 1832 and then later in 1834 as part of a series of engravings commissioned by John Martin for publication in his Seven Ages of Shakespeare.
In a letter to Colnaghi's endorsed 1828, Constable discusses the subject, asking about the fate of his drawing of Jaques as he wanted to make a picture from it. In 1832, he exhibited a watercolour of the subject at the Royal Academy (Private collection, G. Reynolds, The Later Paintings and Drawings of John Constable, 1984, no. 32.9) but whether this is the drawing he wrote to Colnaghi about is uncertain. The composition and format of the present drawing indicate that this rapid study relates to the 1832 watercolour, rather than the later series of drawings for engravings, which are all executed on either square or upright sheets.
We are grateful for Anne Lyles for her help with confirming the attribution and subject of this drawing.
'as he lay along
Under an oak whose antique root peeps out
Upon the brook that brawls along this wood:
To the which place a poor sequester'd stag,
That from the hunter's aim had ta'en a hurt,
Did come to languish,
...the melancholy Jaques,
Stood on the extremest verge of the swift brook',
As You Like It was both Constable and his friend and patron Sir George Beaumont's favourite play and Constable in particular appears to have sympathised with the character of Jaques. In about 1819, Beaumont produced an oil of the subject (now in the Tate, London) which must have further inspired Constable to explore the subject. He appears to have worked on this subject on at least two occasions: the first sometime between the late 1820s and before 1832 and then later in 1834 as part of a series of engravings commissioned by John Martin for publication in his Seven Ages of Shakespeare.
In a letter to Colnaghi's endorsed 1828, Constable discusses the subject, asking about the fate of his drawing of Jaques as he wanted to make a picture from it. In 1832, he exhibited a watercolour of the subject at the Royal Academy (Private collection, G. Reynolds, The Later Paintings and Drawings of John Constable, 1984, no. 32.9) but whether this is the drawing he wrote to Colnaghi about is uncertain. The composition and format of the present drawing indicate that this rapid study relates to the 1832 watercolour, rather than the later series of drawings for engravings, which are all executed on either square or upright sheets.
We are grateful for Anne Lyles for her help with confirming the attribution and subject of this drawing.