Borderlands - National treasures: Constable in Bristol “Truth to Nature”

Chamberlain, Ian

Abstract

The Hay Wain by John Constable is at Bristol Museum & Art Gallery on loan from The National Gallery. Constable’s iconic landscape is the centrepiece in a bold exhibition “Truth to Nature,” which features more than 80 artworks and runs across three galleries.

Painted in 1821 The Hay Wain is an icon of English landscape art. It has been widely reproduced, copied, satirised and politicised. But this image of rural tranquillity was painted at the height of the Industrial Revolution and at a time when land was being sold after the Enclosures Acts: life was changing dramatically for many. “Truth to Nature” explores how landscape has inspired artists from Constable to the present day. Starting with Constable’s The Hay Wain, the exhibition also includes oil sketches by Constable from the Victoria & Albert Museum alongside many rarely seen pieces from Bristol Museum & Art Gallery’s extensive collection.

We contextualise Constable with an early landscape from the 1600s by Jacob van Ruisdael, showing how Constable’s devotion to naturalism signaled a departure from traditional approaches to landscape as a setting for religious or mythological images. “Truth to Nature” also shows Constable’s influence with examples from the Bristol School and 19th century French art. Modernist landscapes from the 20th century by Christopher Wood and Ivon Hitchens sit alongside a conceptual land piece by Richard Long, and abstract landscape by the St Ives artist Peter Lanyon.

This exhibition examines how artists have seen the land as a place of refuge, but also as hostile to humans. We will also show artists’ awareness of human destruction of the land.

“Truth to Nature” will be accompanied by free thought-provoking exhibitions.

Listening in the Dark by Maeve Brennan explores the nocturnal life of bats.
Borderlands will examine the challenges of divided lands.
Charlotte Prodger presents LGBT relations to nature in LHB.
Ian Chamberlain’s contemporary ruins chart the Atlantic Wall.
Yto Barrada’s Sleepers photographs of migrants are a stark vision of the barriers to movement across the land.

• Exhibition Performance Type: Exhibition
• Start Date: May 1, 2024
• End Date: Oct 1, 2024
• Deposit Date: Sep 26, 2024
• Keywords: Printmaking, ruin, border, boundaries
• Public URL: https://uwe-repository.worktribe.com/output/13010822
• External URL: https://www.bristolmuseums.org.uk/whats-on/bristol-museum-and-art-gallery/national-treasures-constable-in-bristol-truth-to-nature/