Review - John Martin: Apocalypse

The Last Man - John Martin

Londoners have been spoilt over the summer months with two fine exhibitions of sacred art at the National Gallery and the British Museum. Today, as we move into autumn, the opening of Tate Britain's latest headline exhibition presents a rather different kind of Christian art.

John Martin (1789-1854) depicted both Heaven and Hell, and it is the latter which often seems to dominate, not only images of the Apocalypse itself, but also images of Biblical disasters and Satan in Council. Martin's monumental images (sometimes in size, but also in sense of scale in smaller frames) are sublime, and frequently frightening. He was a Protestant artist, and painfully, in the central painting of his Last Judgement Triptych, he depicts Catholic clergy among those falling into the abyss - a fact acknowledged in the labelling, but left sensitively unsaid in the sound and light display which transforms the display of these paintings for ten minutes once every half hour.

As the exhibition addresses, Martin's reputation has waxed and waned over the years, which the exhibition interpretation links to changing artistic tastes. Perhaps there may also have been religious objections; certainly today, many visitors to the exhibition might find Martin's fire and brimstone portrait of the apocalypse rather alien (a sense confirmed by snatches of overheard conversations in the exhibition).

Difficulties aside, there is no denying the awesome power of Martin's works, and their display is intelligent; in one room, the viewer can consult copies of the descriptive guide which Martin designed for three of the paintings; the sound and light display is a modern take on an old practice, which brings the Triptych to life in an extraordinary way, whilst leaving the paintings to speak their own drama for two-thirds of the time, and to enjoy the relatively rare opportunity of seeing the three hung together as properly intended.

The short guide included in the ticket price explores Martin's influence in popular culture - in film, fiction, music and art (there is also one example at the end of the exhibition). It is testament to the power of these works to provoke thought and response; this exhibition provides a rare opportunity to see so many of Martin's works together, and to engage in the challenge of imagining the Apocalypse.

The exhibition is part of the Great British Art Debate, a partnership between Tate and several regional museums, which aims, as the name indicates, to stimulate discussion about art and identity in Britain. The curator's blog invites discussion and debate on the exhibition; hopefully one of the sets of questions it might raise will be around art and the religious.

John Martin: Apocalypse runs at the Tate Britain, Millbank until 15 January 2012. Details and tickets available from the Tate's website: www.tate.org.uk/britain/exhibitions/johnmartin/default.shtm

The Great British Art Debate's webpage, where visitors can join in and propose discussions is: http://greatbritishartdebate.tate.org.uk/