Catalogue of the well-known collection of paintings and drawings by John Constable R.A. including The Renowned 'Marine Parade and Chain Pier, Brighton', Portraits; Oil Sketches of Landscapes, Clouds, Seascapes; Water-Colours, Pencil Drawings, Etc.; Also Important Water-Colours and Drawings by Bonington, Gainsborough and Girtin; Oil Paintings by Cotman and Richard Wilson; Fine Modern Pictures by Sickert and Utrillo , the property of Dr. H.A.C. Gregory, M.C. [ Sotheby & Co., auction catalogue, sale date: 20 July 1949 ]

Sotheby & Co, London, illustrated auction catalogue for the sale held on 20th July, 1949. Green printed wrappers, 4to, 25 cm,. 24 pp, 15 plates, including frontispiece , ills. 136 lots. From the preface: "The collection catalogued in the following pages forms probably the most important sale of Constable’s works that has ever taken place, including not only one of Constable’s great masterpieces but some twenty portraits and oil-sketches and some sixty water-colours and drawings. Dr. H. A. C. Gregory has for years searched with single-minded enthusiasm for fine Constable material: as he has collected, so he has weeded out of his collection any item which from his acquired knowledge or from the criticisms of the foremost specialists on Constable he has come to consider of doubtful authenticity. .. Now that Constable has been recognised as the starting point of the Impressionist movement, the taste of the public has comparatively recently veered from the highly-finished Exhibition pieces of his later years to the productions of his middle period, and especially to the brilliant and highly personal sketches of cloudscapes and countryside which came as a revelation to so many at the time of the Exhibition at the Victoria and Albert Museum in 1946. The most important picture in this collection, the 'Marine Parade and Chain Pier, Brighton', is a consummate example of Constable’s work at the height of his powers. It is said that it was in part painted (under considerable difficulties) in the open air, in face of the subject itself; and certainly this painting has an exceptional feeling for nature and for atmosphere. Small abrasion to rear wrapper, otherwise Near Very Good.