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John Martin
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The_Eve_of_the_Deluge
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| 1840 Oil on canvas, 143 x 218 cm Royal Collection, Windsor John Martin had humble beginnings in Newcastle-upon-Tyne as a herald painter to a coach-builder, and then in London as a painter on china and glass, but he later achieved a great success with his highly imaginative paintings of scenes from a variety of literary sources, particularly the Old Testament. Many of these pictures were executed on a vast scale and were frequently visionary in conception. The impact of Martin's paintings was also enhanced by his use of vivid contrasts in colour, which served to emphasise the grandeur and other-worldliness of his compositions, and the varying thickness of the paint surface. Apart from his paintings Martin was also a prolific illustrator and engraver, as well as a practising urban engineer. It was while Prince Albert was visiting Martin's studio that he saw one of the artist's major works, The Deluge (the second version of 1834, present whereabouts unknown), and suggested that the artist paint the related themes - The Eve of the Deluge and The Assuaging of the Waters - in order to make a series. It would seem, however, that the artist himself had already developed the idea for such a sequence. The subject of The Eve of the Deluge is ultimately based on Genesis 6:5-8, in which God despairs of man's wickedness on earth and decides to destroy him with the single exception of Noah. The figures on the promontory in the foreground are the patriarchs. The seated figure with a white beard is Methuselah, who is surrounded by the family of Noah. Methuselah instructs Noah to open the scroll written by his father, Enoch, so that he can compare the signs in the sky (sun, moon and comet) with those on the scroll. The fact that they match ordains the end of the world and this results in Methuselah's death. The figures hurrying up the slope include those described in the Bible as 'giants in the earth in those days'. In the middle distance, under the trees on the right, is a group of revellers representing the antediluvian age. Their behaviour has no doubt undermined God's confidence in man. Ravens, a symbol of ill omen, circle overhead. The ark, which Noah was instructed to build in order to save himself, his family and the animals, is visible on a distant promontory in the background on the right. Both The Eve of the Deluge and The Assuaging of the Waters were exhibited at the Royal Academy in 1840, and The Eve of the Deluge was acquired by Prince Albert the following year. The Assuaging of the Waters is now in San Francisco Museum of Fine Arts. Martin published his own account of these three paintings in a pamphlet entitled The Deluge of 1840. This shows that his sources were fairly recondite, extending beyond the historical and the religious to the cosmological and the eschatological, including Byron's Heaven and Earth. 'Altogether the three paintings amount to a history of the world, summarized in the terms of documentary mythology and dioramic episodes, compressed into three scenes - evening, |
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British
1789-1854
John Martin Gallery
His first exhibited subject picture, Sadak in Search of the Waters of Oblivion (now in the St. Louis Art Museum), was hung in the Ante-room of the Royal Academy in 1812, and sold for fifty guineas. It was followed by the Expulsion (1813), Paradise (1813), Clytie (1814), and Joshua Commanding the Sun to Stand Still upon Gibeon (1816). In 1821 appeared his Belshazzar's Feast, which excited much favorable and hostile comment, and was awarded a prize of £200 at the British Institution, where the Joshua had previously carried off a premium of £100. Then came the Destruction of Herculaneum (1822), the Creation (1824), the Eve of the Deluge (1841), and a series of other Biblical and imaginative subjects. The Plains of Heaven is thought to reflect his memories of the Allendale of his youth.
Martin's large paintings were inspired by "contemporary dioramas or panoramas, popular entertainments in which large painted cloths were displayed, and animated by the skilful use of artificial light. Martin has often been claimed as a forerunner of the epic cinema, and there is no doubt that the pioneer director D. W. Griffith was aware of his work." In turn, the diorama makers borrowed Martin's work, to the point of plagiarism. A 2000-square-foot version of Belshazzar's Feast was mounted at a facility called the British Diorama in 1833; Martin tried, but failed, to shut down the display with a court order. Another diorama of the same picture was staged in New York City in 1835. These dioramas were tremendous successes with their audiences, but wounded Martin's reputation in the serious art world.
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