Oil paint on canvas
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<a href="https://www.tate.org.uk/art/artists/john-constable-108" aria-label="More by John Constable" data-gtm-name="header_link_artist" data-gtm-destination="page--artist">John Constable</a>
Church Porch East Bergholt
Presented by Miss Isabel Constable 1888
adults
architecture
church
contemplation
East Anglia
East Bergholt, St Mary’s Church
emotions and human qualities
emotions, concepts and ideas
England
England, East
figure
graveyard
Gray, Thomas, ‘Elegy Written in a Country Churchyard’, 1751
literature (not Shakespeare)
literature and fiction
path
people
places
religious
Suffolk
townscapes / man-made features
UK cities, towns and villages
UK counties
UK countries and regions
<p>Three figures sit and talk outside the church in East Bergholt, the village in Suffolk where Constable was born. A man, wearing a red cloak and tricorn hat, and a woman lean on the tombs while a younger girl sits opposite. These figures, old and young, and their placement in the graveyard may have been a deliberate way to build a deeper meaning into the scene, about the passage of time and our mortality. Though it is small, this was an important work for Constable – we think it was the first painting he submitted himself for exhibition at the Royal Academy.</p><p><em>Gallery label, October 2023</em></p>
painting oil paint canvas
19 August 2002 – 27 April 2003
2003-04-27
19 August 2002 – 27 April 2003
2003-04-27
2002-08-19
Tate Britain (London, UK)
http://www.tate.org.uk/britain/
2002-08-19
Outdoor Sketching
Collection based display
26 August 2002 – 9 March 2003
2003-03-09
26 August 2002 – 9 March 2003
2003-03-09
2002-08-26
Tate Britain (London, UK)
http://www.tate.org.uk/britain/
2002-08-26
Constable
Collection based display
12 May 2003 – 23 April 2006
2006-04-23
12 May 2003 – 23 April 2006
2006-04-23
2003-05-12
Tate Britain (London, UK)
http://www.tate.org.uk/britain/
2003-05-12
Constable 2
Collection based display
1 June 2006 – 28 August 2006
2006-08-28
1 June 2006 – 28 August 2006
2006-08-28
2006-06-01
Tate Britain (London, UK)
http://www.tate.org.uk/britain/
2006-06-01
Constable: The Great Landscapes
Exhibition
28 May 2007 – 31 March 2008
2008-03-31
28 May 2007 – 31 March 2008
2008-03-31
2007-05-28
Tate Britain (London, UK)
http://www.tate.org.uk/britain/
2007-05-28
John Constable: Marking Out a Path
Collection based display
14 April 2012 – 27 March 2013
2013-03-27
14 April 2012 – 27 March 2013
2013-03-27
2012-04-14
Tate Britain (London, UK)
http://www.tate.org.uk/britain/
2012-04-14
Constable / Turner
Collection based display
5 April 2013 – 10 August 2014
2014-08-10
5 April 2013 – 10 August 2014
2014-08-10
2013-04-05
Tate Britain (London, UK)
http://www.tate.org.uk/britain/
2013-04-05
Constable
Collection based display
7 February 2015 – 1 March 2020
2020-03-01
7 February 2015 – 1 March 2020
2020-03-01
2015-02-07
Tate Britain (London, UK)
http://www.tate.org.uk/britain/
2015-02-07
Constable
Collection based display
20 February 2021 – 4 February 2023
2023-02-04
20 February 2021 – 31 May 2021
2021-05-31
2021-02-20
Mitsubishi Ichigokan (Tokyo, Japan)
2021-02-20
Constable and England: A History of His Affections
Tate partnerships & programmes
13 March 2023
Tate Britain (London, UK)
http://www.tate.org.uk/britain/
2023-03-13
Gallery 108
Collection based display
11 July 2026 – 4 October 2026
2026-10-04
11 July 2026 – 4 October 2026
2026-10-04
2026-07-11
Christchurch Mansion (Ipswich, UK)
2026-07-11
Constable 250
Loan-out
The Church Porch, East Bergholt
support: 445 × 359 mm
frame: 640 × 555 × 70 mm
Presented by Miss Isabel Constable 1888
<div class="text">
<p>Three figures sit and talk outside the church in East Bergholt, the village in Suffolk where Constable was born. A man, wearing a red cloak and tricorn hat, and a woman lean on the tombs while a younger girl sits opposite. These figures, old and young, and their placement in the graveyard may have been a deliberate way to build a deeper meaning into the scene, about the passage of time and our mortality. Though it is small, this was an important work for Constable – we think it was the first painting he submitted himself for exhibition at the Royal Academy.</p>
</div>

Display caption
2023-10-25T00:00:00
display-caption
DISPLAY_CAPTION
<p><a class="acno-pop" data-gtm-destination="page--artwork" data-gtm-name="body_text_link" href="https://www.tate.org.uk/art/artworks/constable-the-church-porch-east-bergholt-n01245" title="View the details of this artwork"><span>N01245</span></a> <b>The Church Porch, East Bergholt</b> Exhibited 1810
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<br/>Oil on canvas, 17 1/2×14 1/8 (44.5×35.9).</p>
<p>Prov: presented by Isabel Constable to the National Gallery 1888; transferred to the Tate Gallery 1951. Accession <span>N01245</span>.
<br/>Exh: R.A. 1810 (116, ‘A church-yard’); B.I. 1811 (185, ‘A church porch’, size of frame 25×22 inches); Manchester 1956(15); Tate Gallery 1976(99).
<br/>Engr: in mezzotint by David Lucas as ‘Porch of the Church at East Bergholt, Suffolk’, published by Lucas 1845, although the publication line reads 1843 (Shirley 1930, No.42).
<br/>Lit: Leslie 1843, pp.10, 68, 1845, pp.21, 22–3, 198, 1951, pp.20, 21, 182; Holmes 1902, pp.81, 118, 242; Shirley 1937, pp.31, 37, 40, 41; Davies 1946, pp.26–7; Chamot 1956, p.258; Kitson 1957, pp.342, 347 n. 48; Beckett 1961, Paintings: Suffolk B(5) No.11; Hoozee 1979, No.99.
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<br/>This is the first oil <a class="glossarylinktopopup" data-gtm-destination="article-page" data-gtm-name="body_text_link" href="http://www.tate.org.uk/learn/online-resources/glossary/p/painting" title="Glossary definition for 'Painting'"><span>painting</span></a> by Constable that can be identified with any certainty as a work he himself exhibited. Leslie's account of ‘A church porch’ which Constable sent to the British Institution in 1811 corresponds closely with the picture: ‘The “Porch” is that of Bergholt Church, and the stillness of a summer afternoon is broken only by the voice of an old man, to whom a woman and a girl sitting on one of the tombs are listening. As in many of the finest Dutch pictures, the fewness of the parts constitutes a charm in this little work; such is its extreme simplicity of effect, that it has nothing to arrest the attention, but when once noticed, few pictures would longer detain a mind of any sensibility’. In his second edition Leslie added: ‘I have heard the word sentiment ridiculed when applied to representations of inanimate objects. But no other word can express that from which the impression of this picture results, independently of the figures’. David Lucas' <a class="glossarylinktopopup" data-gtm-destination="article-page" data-gtm-name="body_text_link" href="http://www.tate.org.uk/learn/online-resources/glossary/e/engraving" title="Glossary definition for 'Engraving'"><span>engraving</span></a> entitled ‘Porch of the Church at East Bergholt, Suffolk’ also corresponds with No.7 and, in an annotation to the passage from Leslie quoted above, Lucas identified the 1811 exhibit with the work he had engraved (JC:FDC, p.55). Leslie himself made the same identification in the copy of his book which he presented to Samuel Rogers (in the compiler's collection). It seems reasonable to assume that No.7 was also the work exhibited at the R.A. in 1810 as ‘A church-yard’. It was common practice to send to the B.I. a picture which had failed to sell. at the previous year's <a class="glossarylinktopopup" data-gtm-destination="article-page" data-gtm-name="body_text_link" href="http://www.tate.org.uk/learn/online-resources/glossary/a/academy" title="Glossary definition for 'Academy'"><span>Academy</span></a>, and the title of the 1810 exhibit is perfectly appropriate to No.7 (indeed, in 1830 Constable himself referred to it by this name, as will be seen later). A slight difficulty arises from the fact that Leslie mentioned the 1810 and 1811 exhibits in their respective years without making any connection between them. However, this problem applies only to the second edition of his book: the first does not mention the 1810 exhibit at all. When adding the title of the latter to his second edition, Leslie may simply have failed to notice a possible connection with the painting he had already described in the following chapter.
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<br/>An old man with two girls grouped about a tombstone in East Bergholt churchyard is also the subject of a <a class="glossarylinktopopup" data-gtm-destination="article-page" data-gtm-name="body_text_link" href="http://www.tate.org.uk/learn/online-resources/glossary/d/drawing" title="Glossary definition for 'Drawing'"><span>drawing</span></a> Constable made around 1806 as an illustration to A Select collection of Epitaphs and monumental inscriptions, published by J. Raw of Ipswich that year (Fig. 1, Louvre RF 6110, TG 1976 No.61). <sup>1</sup> In Chapman's engraving of it in the book, the first words of the first two lines of ‘The Epitaph’ to Gray's Elegy are clearly visible on the tombstone. No.7 plainly also belongs to the tradition of churchyard melancholy in painting and poetry of which Gray's Elegy was the progenitor. When Leslie borrowed No.7 in 1830 for his sister Ann to copy, Constable wrote: ‘My dear Leslie, I send the “Churchyard”, which my friends in Portman Place are welcome to use for any purpose but to go into it... The motto on the dial is “Ut umbra sic vita”’ (Leslie 1843, p.68, 1951, p.182). Constable later supplied illustrations for Martin's edition of the Elegy (see under No.40 below and TG 1976 Nos 298–302).
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<br/>The porch of East Bergholt church is seen from a similar but not identical angle in several studies in the V.&amp;A. (R. 67, 70, 99 and p.82 of R.132), in a <a class="glossarylinktopopup" data-gtm-destination="article-page" data-gtm-name="body_text_link" href="http://www.tate.org.uk/learn/online-resources/glossary/w/watercolour" title="Glossary definition for 'Watercolour'"><span>watercolour</span></a> in the National Gallery of Canada, and in other works. None of these, however, is directly related to No.7. According to Holmes, a watercolour more closely connected with this painting was in Sir J.C.Robinson's sale at Christie's, 21 April 1902 (186, 8×5 3/4 inches). Many other drawings and paintings of the church, from different angles, are known. Mr David G. Taylor has noticed that the red cloak and black tricorne worn by the left-hand figure in No.7 occur also in the otherwise unrelated painting ‘Edge of a Wood’ in the Art Gallery of Ontario (H.273).<sup>2</sup>
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<br/>1. Pencil and watercolour, 4 7/16×3 1/8 (11.2×7.9).
<br/>
<br/>2. David G. Taylor, ‘New light on an early painting by John Constable’, The Burlington Magazine, CXXII, 1980, p.568.</p>
<p>
<br/><b>Published in:</b>
<br/>Leslie Parris, <i>The Tate Gallery Constable Collection</i>, London 1981
<br/></p>

Catalogue entry
2004-09-23T00:00:00
catalogue-entry
CATALOGUE_ENTRY
adults architecture church contemplation East Anglia East Bergholt, St Mary’s Church emotions and human qualities emotions, concepts and ideas England England, East figure graveyard Gray, Thomas, ‘Elegy Written in a Country Churchyard’, 1751 literature and fiction literature (not Shakespeare) path people places religious Suffolk townscapes / man-made features UK cities, towns and villages UK counties UK countries and regions