Elegy Landscapes

May 7, 2018
Poet Plumly (The Immortal Evening) studies the lives and legacies of English Romantic painters John Constable (1776–1837) and J.M.W. Turner (1775–1851), who he argues are “two of the greatest landscape painters regardless of nation or generation” in this vibrant dual biography. Plumly presents Constable as “a poet of place,” whose landscapes—especially his renderings of the Stour River valley—are steeped in nostalgia for the land’s pastoral past; whereas Turner is the more visionary of the two, as evident in his “transformation of landscape into the constituents of light.” Not favoring either artist over the other, Plumly compares and contrasts their work over the course of their lives, showing how their origins and ambitions, as well as life events—notably the death of Constable’s wife in 1828 and the death of Turner’s beloved father in 1829—shaped major phases of their careers. The book cries out for more illustration than its eight pages of color art reproduction, but Plumly’s poetic prose helps the reader to visualize the works, as when he writes, of Constable’s cloud studies, “he sees the equivalent of the invisible made visible, something beyond vapor,” and of Turner’s later paintings that he is “creating landscape as mist, as something ephemeral.” Plumly’s eye for detail and eloquent powers of description make this book a significant work of art history.

June 1, 2018
A finely curated exploration of the progressive landscape paintings of John Constable (1776-1837) and J.M.W. Turner (1775-1851).In this rhapsodic investigation, Plumly (English/Univ. of Maryland; Against Sunset: Poems, 2016, etc.) positions these two master painters on a threshold in art history. Both Constable and Turner found that landscapes could mean more than simply their geography. Constable's work was imbued with autobiography and English history, while Turner looked forward, toward what may come when the storms pass and the clouds clear. "Constable's genius," Plumly explains, "invites a vision of what was...and Turner's genius demands a vision of what will be." Each artist found a way to incorporate narrative into their pastoral scenes, transcending traditional Arcadian visions into something more compelling and personally resonant. "The subtext of narrative is time," writes the author, "the subtext of time is emotion, the subtext of emotion, therefore, is mortality." Citing critics from John Ruskin to John Berger, Plumly chronicles Constable's and Turner's output as well as reception, detailing exhibitions at the Royal Academy and reactions from collectors across Europe. As a poet, the author is a particularly effective art historian, capable of re-creating these sublime masterpieces with his inspired prose. Constable's Stour Valley paintings are "indelible narratives of lost time," while Turner's circular brushwork is "made alive" by a "unique combustion of colors, as if the color wheel is being turned and converted into the blended hues and shades of nature." The author resists a traditional chronology, opting instead for a Turner-like vortex around major works by each artist and a particular idea. Some chapters focus on the artists' work with clouds and sky, some invoke Keats and Tennyson, and others touch on the artists' relations to groups like the pre-Raphaelites or the impressionists. This is a fresh way to curate these works for those familiar with Turner and Constable, but newcomers will find themselves yearning for a more biographical approach.A polyphonic, scholarly study of two of art history's most important figures.

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August 1, 2018

How did two men living at the same time, in roughly the same place, with similar careers manage to live wildly different lives? Plumly (Posthumous Keats; The Immortal Evening) tells us exactly how in this dual biography of landscape painters John Constable (1776-1837) and William Turner (1775-1851). Born a year apart and with 14 years between their deaths, both artists chose the natural world as their subject for paintings that would later inspire impressionists and modernists. Although they were considered rivals, their lives could not help but be intertwined. Plumly offers a well-rounded look at both men's personal lives and artistic styles, depicting them as separate but equal artists heavily influenced by their individual experiences. VERDICT Fans of the English landscape and 18th- and 19th-century art will enjoy this successful deep dive into the lives of Constable and Turner.--Rebecca Kluberdanz, New York P.L.

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