Constants grandfather on his mother's side was a tailor. Constant wore a purple suit made by his grandfather when he met Gerrit Kouwenaar on the Magere brug (Skinny Bridge) on a summer day in Amsterdam in 1942. Gerrit Kouwenaar later described this first meeting in the opening speech of an exhibition of Constant in Galerie Le Canard, 26 Januari 1952, with the following words:
Constant grew up in a Catholic environment and attended Saint Ignatius College, a Jesuit college in Amsterdam. In 1936 he painted his first oil painting and chose a religious subject: “The Emmaus Travellers”. Constant painted this work on an old burlap sack and used pigment from a house painter that he bought with his pocket money. Soon, other works of art with religious themes would follow. Not much later, however, he distances himself from the church and during WW II there is a definite break.
circa 1936
