Constable and his churches

Susan Gray
04 June 2026, The Tablet

Salisbury Cathedral from the Meadows

PRIVATE COLLECTION; COLCHESTER AND IPSWICH MUSEUMS SERVICE/IPSWICH BOROUGH COUNCIL COLLECTION

When The Hay Wain (1821) goes on display at Christchurch Mansion this summer, it will be the first time the painting has been exhibited in Suffolk.

A BUST-UP BETWEEN a brewer and an archdeacon, leaving an artist unpaid for a church painting, sounds more like an episode from the life of Caravaggio than the upstanding Anglican John Constable. But this is the story behind The Ascension, 1821-22, created for St Michael’s in Manningtree, Essex.

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