At the Root of Images

In the Sunley Room at the National Gallery, there is an important and thought-provoking exhibition titled Discover Constable and the Hay Wain. Constable's The Hay Wain is perhaps his most famous painting, created in Flatford (Suffolk).

In this painting, "a hay wagon is being driven across a shallow mill pond, and haymakers can be seen working in the meadow in the distance. A little dog patrols the mill pond bank, and a woman collects water from a house, which was then owned by a farmer, William Lott. The scene portrays an idyllic rural life, but it is an idealized image. When the painting was created, Britain's landscape was rapidly transforming due to industrialization and urbanization.

Painted in his London studio, the picture is often interpreted as Constable's reaction to these transformations—the noise, ugliness, and pollution. As such, it is a nostalgic work, embodying Constable's deep connection to the land and rivers, which he claimed made him a painter. Yet, the agricultural workers he depicts faced a precarious future, though they appear here in harmony with the land. The Hay Wain was considered radical in its time for its scale, texture, color palette, and Constable's close attention to natural detail."

As we approach the Advent season, this perspective invites reflection. The artist's viewpoint can model how we await and prepare—teaching us to turn toward the world and share God's loving gaze on human history.

However, we are still in a pre-Advent state, caught up in an increasingly industrialized (or digitalized?) life. Our lives, much like those of Constable's time, are driven by the relentless forces of capitalism. Our landscapes, both internal and external, are undergoing dramatic transformations.

Without the artist's vision, such historical changes might fade into forgotten history, leaving us in a world devoid of remembered beauty. Yet art interrupts this forgetting. Art has the power to freeze the uncontrolled flow of the digital into a still image. Indeed, art could be defined as still frames of our humanity—frames we can contemplate, which halt us in our hurried lives.

The art historian I cited interprets Constable's work as nostalgia, a longing for an idealized past. But is it truly just nostalgia? Is it merely a romanticized yearning for a bygone era?

There is more to it than that. The painting's beauty lies in its advocacy for the people of that landscape. It speaks for William Lott, the farmer, and his contemporaries, commemorating their vanished lives and suffering. It preserves the beauty of their existence, their world, and their labor. This beauty, articulated by the painting, becomes an intercessory prayer. It is an artistic disruption of despair and anxiety caused by the dramatic changes of the time.

This iconic British landscape provides a model for Advent's interruption. We are called to be open to His coming. Before Advent, we are captives—bound by structures of domination, impatience, and restlessness. In our own time, we face "Industrialization 2.0." The beauty Constable created reflects the beauty of the Advent season: God's beauty and His original vision for humanity, which disrupts the ugliness overshadowing our lives.

This is not "nostalgic beauty." It is Christian beauty in the present. It is hope. And this hope—God's viewpoint, the artist's viewpoint, and the Christian's viewpoint—awakens us. It opens us to what lies beyond our wounded history and beyond the self. The beauty of Advent, I wish for all of us, disrupts the familiar.

Like Constable's The Hay Wain, Advent teaches us to bring new beginnings of Divine Beauty into places overshadowed or forgotten. Let our perspective be humble. Let us, perhaps, join the little dog in the painting, faithfully patrolling the mill pond bank as humble servants and stewards of the Kingdom of God's Beauty.

 

28.11.2024