Constable sketch held privately for 200 years fetches £72,000

A John Constable drawing, kept in private hands for nearly 200 years, has finally sold for almost £72,000 after a fierce bidding war.

The 1827 drawing was inscribed by Constable “Flatford / 13 Oct / 1827” and gifted to his second son, Charles Golding Constable.

It depicts the warden’s house, Valley Farm – a fifteenth-century timber-framed hall house near Flatford Mill, Suffolk.

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Executed on 1824 Whatman paper from a sketchbook known to have been used during Constable’s 1827 visits to Flatford, the sheet is recorded in Graham Reynolds’ catalogues but had never before appeared on the open market.

After Charles’ death in 1878, the work was passed through his widow, Anna Maria Constable, to family friend, James Henry Beazley.

A label on the reverse said: “This sketch was presented to the late James Beazley by the widow or relative of Constable the artist, out of gratitude for a slight service rendered to her by him.”

The drawing remained with Beazley’s descendants ever since, as reported by What’s The Jam.

Constable’s deep attachment to the Suffolk landscape ran throughout his career.

Though based in London, he continually returned to the Stour Valley and Dedham Vale, painting the familiar scenery surrounding his family’s Flatford Mill, later immortalised in The Hay Wain.

Expert Lara L’vov-Basirov, said: “Constable’s works on paper rarely come to auction and those with direct family provenance are even scarcer.

“This result reflects both the quality of the drawing and the strength of demand for fresh material linked to the artist’s personal circle.”

Estimated at £20,000 to £30,000 the drawing sparked an online and phone bidding battle.

It sold to a private UK buyer for £71,740 at Roseberys, south London.

Constable’s paintings are considered treasures of British art.

But in his lifetime his work was appreciated more in France than England.

Constable’s most famous painting, The Hay Wain, now in the National Gallery in London, was first shown at the Paris Salon in 1824.

He had to wait until he was 52 years old before the Royal Academy voted him a member.

Constable was influenced by the French painter Claude Lorrain.

His most famous paintings are landscapes showing the countryside around Dedham and Flatford, where his father’s mills were.

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