Salisbury Cathedral from Bishop's Garden (1826). Oil on canvas. 89 x 112. Constable's Salisbury Cathedral from Bishop's Garden (1826, Frick Collection) depicts the church bathed in warm light against a backdrop of lush greenery and grazing cows. He created an oil painting with the same title (c1825, Metropolitan Museum) as a key study for this final work, showcasing a similar view with slight variations in elements like trees and figures. The painting's meticulous attention to detail in the cathedral and surrounding landscape suggests influence from Dutch landscape paintings such as Jacob van Ruisdael's Jewish Cemetery (c1657, Detroit Institute of Arts), which uses dramatic light and shadow to create a sense of depth. In turn, Constable's focus on the harmonious relationship between the cathedral and nature may have influenced the awe-inspiring landscape of Caspar David Friedrich Wanderer above Sea of Mist (c1818, Kunsthalle Hamburg), where religious symbolism blends with the vastness of nature. Constable's approach to light and atmosphere also anticipated the Impressionist movement, with works like Claude Monet's Rouen Cathedral in Sunlight (1894, Metropolitan Museum) capturing the fleeting effects of light on a grand structure. Constable visited Salisbury in 1820 and made a series of oil sketches of the cathedral, which served as the model for this composition. The artist selected a viewpoint from the bishop's garden and included figures of Dr. Fisher and his wife at the bottom left. Following its exhibition at the 1823 Royal Academy, Constable observed: My Cathedral looks very well. It was the most difficult subject in Landscape I ever had upon my Easel. I have not flinched at the work of the windows, buttresses, but I have as usual made my escape in the Evanescence of the Chiaro-Oscuro. His patron took exception to the dark cloud over the cathedral, and when he commissioned a smaller replica, requested a more serene sky. The painting embodies the full range of qualities of a quintessentially British landscape painting-the clouds, trees, a water meadow, cattle drinking at the edge of the pasture and the glorious architecture of a medieval cathedral-but all on a human scale. Paintings like this one have so conditioned our view of rural Britain that it is now difficult to imagine a time when the countryside and country life were not held in such high regard. A version of the painting also resides at the Frick Collection in New York City. It is slightly different in that it shows different weather and hence light. Whereas the London version depicts the cathedral with an overcast sky, the version in the Frick shows the cathedral with a clear, bright sky. A small version of the painting resides at the Huntington Library in San Marino, California. John Fisher gave it to his daughter as a wedding present. There is an earlier, homonymous version of this painting at Sao Paulo Museum of Art in Sao Paulo. It is said that Fisher, seeing its sombre and grave colors, disliked it and asked for a happier, lighter one. One of the oil sketches made in 1820 resides at the National Gallery of Canada in Ottawa.