Yale Center for British Art Announces Fall Publications

NEW HAVEN, CT (September 8, 2025) — This fall, the Yale Center for British Art (YCBA) unveils three major publications that span centuries of British art—from Romantic luminaries to a leading voice in contemporary practice. Blake, Constable, and Hew Locke: Passages bring together new scholarship, extraordinary images, and fresh perspectives on artists whose work continues to shape the cultural imagination, underscoring the museum’s role as a leader in the study and presentation of British art. 

Blake, the second installment in YCBA’s Collection Series, examines the art and methods of William Blake (1757–1827) through the lens of one of the great collections of his work, comprising more than nine hundred works and largely assembled by the YCBA’s founder, the philanthropist Paul Mellon. Released in conjunction with the exhibition William Blake: Burning Bright, the new publication is written by Elizabeth Wyckoff, the YCBA’s Curator of Prints and Drawings and curator of Burning Bright, with an essay by literary scholar and art historian  Sarah T. Weston. The book features exquisite reproductions of Blake’s paintings, watercolors, prints, and illustrated books, including the only hand-colored copy of his epic poem Jerusalem.

Constable, the third installment in YCBA’s Collection Series, celebrates one of England’s greatest landscape painters, John Constable (1776–1837). Written by leading historian of British art Tim Barringer, with a contribution by Nicholas Robbin, the volume considers the artist’s revolutionary approach to nature, his influence on modernism, and the resonance of his work in contemporary climate discourse.

Hew Locke: Passages offers the first comprehensive examination of the career of artist Hew Locke (b. 1959), who is renowned for his multimedia explorations that deconstruct and reimagine deeply entrenched iconographies of British sovereignty. Released in conjunction with a major exhibition organized by the YCBA of the same title, this richly illustrated catalogue showcases the full spectrum of Locke’s practice. Co-edited by Martina Droth, Paul Mellon Director of the YCBA and curator of the corresponding exhibition, and Allie Biswas, the publication includes essays by leading curators and scholars that place his work in the context of colonial and postcolonial history and theory.

All three titles are distributed by Yale University Press and are available through the YCBA’s Museum Bookshop as well as other major booksellers.

Publication Details

BLAKE 

By Elizabeth Wyckoff, with a contribution by Sarah T. Weston
136 pages | 113 color illustrations | $40 | ISBN 978-0-300-28457-7 | Publication date: September 30, 2025

William Blake (1757–1827) stands alone as a towering figure in both British art and literature. The mythic, spiritual, and pastoral themes of his visual art and poetry influenced contemporaries such as Samuel Palmer and John Linnell and have served as sources of inspiration for modern-day luminaries like Allen Ginsberg, Bob Dylan, R. Crumb, and Patti Smith.

The second volume in the YCBA Collection Series (following Turner), Blake showcases the breadth and depth of the museum’s holdings, featuring exquisite reproductions of this visionary artist’s paintings, watercolors, and prints, and selections from his illuminated books, including the only fully hand-colored copy of the epic poem Jerusalem. The publication also offers essays by Elizabeth Wyckoff, Curator of Prints and Drawings, and the literary scholar and art historian Sarah T. Weston that explore Blake’s biography, poetry, painting, and printmaking and use digital humanities research to highlight his unique artistic process in a manner that will engage the general reader and expert alike.

This publication coincides with the exhibition William Blake: Burning Bright at the Yale Center for British Art August 26–November 30, 2025.

CONSTABLE 

By Tim Barringer, with a contribution by Nicholas Robbins
128 pages | 113 color illustrations | $40 
ISBN 978-0-300-28466-9 | Publication date: September 16, 2025

John Constable (1776–1837) is celebrated today as one of Britain’s greatest painters. While his depictions of the Suffolk countryside have become icons of Englishness, his work is of international importance. Constable’s dynamic, expressive style—rooted in direct observation—revolutionized the artistic representation of the natural world and exerted a profound influence on later generations of artists, from Eugène Delacroix and the Impressionists to Lucian Freud.

This generously illustrated volume—the third installment in the YCBA Collection Series (subsequent Turner and Blake)—situates Constable within the culture of his time and considers his rich legacy through the museum’s extensive holdings. Leading historian of British art Tim Barringer surveys Constable’s practice across media and genres, tracing the artist’s response to landscape traditions and revealing the potent commentary on social change woven into his evocative rural scenes. Nicholas Robbins, whose scholarship investigates the relationship between art and environmental science, explores Constable’s cloud studies in the context of nineteenth-century discourses on climate. As this publication reveals, the issues with which Constable’s art contends are as relevant today as they were in his lifetime. 

HEW LOCKE: PASSAGES 

By Martina Droth and Allie Biswas, with contributions by Kelly Baum, Indie A Choudhury, Hew Locke, Saloni Mathur, Asma Naeem, Rachel Stratton, and Clarrie Wallis
304 pages | 280 color illustrations | $75 
ISBN 978-0-300-28468-3 | Publication date: September 30, 2025

For thirty years, the Guyanese British artist Hew Locke (b. 1959) has upended the visual codes of imperialism and scrutinized the British Empire’s present-day legacies of colonialism and global capitalism. His dynamic aesthetic encompasses sculpture, photography, drawing, and intricate assemblages that combine nontraditional materials such as cardboard, fabric, beads, sequins, and ready-made toys. Edited by Paul Mellon Director of the Yale Center for British Art Martina Droth and the independent curator and writer Allie Biswas, Hew Locke: Passages showcases the remarkable breadth of Locke’s distinctive practice. Thematic essays from leading curators, critics, and scholars of contemporary art provide the most comprehensive presentation to date of the work of this visionary artist renowned for his incisive interrogations of colonial and postcolonial power.

The exhibition Hew Locke: Passages is on view at the Yale Center for British Art October 2, 2025, through January 11, 2026. It will then travel across the U.S. with presentations at the Wexner Center for the Arts, Columbus, Ohio, where it will be on view February 13 through May 24, 2026, and to the Museum of Fine Arts, Houston, Texas, where it will be on view June 21 through September 13, 2026. 

About the Yale Center for British Art

Opened in 1977 through the generosity of Yale graduate and philanthropist Paul Mellon, the Yale Center for British Art holds the largest and most significant collection of British art outside the United Kingdom. The collection spans more than five centuries and is the foundation for a museum uniquely focused on the histories, legacies, and shifting contexts of British art. Housed in a celebrated modernist building designed by Louis I. Kahn, the museum is situated on the Yale University campus in the city of New Haven. It is free and open to all.

Download the media kit here. 

Press Contacts

Yale Center for British Art
ycba.press@yale.edu | +1 203 432 2856

Hanna Gisel, Hanna Gisel Communications
hanna@hannagisel.com | +1 716 866 5302