Portrait of an Artist sketching

Details

John Constable, R.A. (1776-1837)
Portrait of an Artist sketching
with inscription 'from Captn. Constable's collection/said to be his own portrait.' (on the mount, lower right), and with further inscription 'No19/John Constable, R.A. Drawing, "Portrait of the artist sketching." 180/(1801)/Collection J.P. Heseltine./Reproduced in Norfolk and Suffolk Painters No 5/Exhibited - Oxford Arts Club Oct. - Nov 1937. No 50./Mentioned in Memoirs of the Life of John Constable, C.R Leslie. Hon: A Shirley,/(Medici 1937) p.33.' (on the reverse of the mount)
pencil
6¼ x 3 7/8in. (15.8 x 9.8cm.)

Provenance

Charles Golding Constable.
Percy Moore Turner.
J.P. Heseltine.
H.A.C. Gregory; Sotheby's London, 20 July 1949, lot 68.
Agnew's.

Literature

C.R. Leslie, Memoirs of the Life of John Constable, R.A., Hertford, 1937, p.33, ed. A. Shirley.

Exhibited

London, Wildenstein, Constable Centenary Exhibition, 21 April - 29 May 1937, no.94.
Aldeburgh, Festival Exhibition, 1948, no.28.
London, Arts Council of Great Britain, John Constable, 1949, no.30.

Lot Essay

This free and lively drawing, which was previously thought to show John Constable painting, dates from about 1814 and may possibly show John Dunthorne, Junior, the son of Constable's Suffolk friend John Dunthorne. John Dunthorne, Junior became Constable's studio assistant in 1814 when he was 16 and worked for Constable until his premature death in 1832.

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