John Martin was born at Haydon Bridge, near Hexham in Northumberland on 19 July 1789. He was apprenticed by his father to a coachbuilder in Newcastle-upon-Tyne to learn heraldic painting, but owing to a quarrel, the indentures were cancelled, and he was placed under Bonifacio Musso, an Italian artist. With his master, Martin removed from Newcastle to London in 1806, where he married at the age of 19 and supported himself by giving drawing lessons, and by painting in water colours, and on china and glass. His leisure was occupied in the study of perspective and architecture. 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 50 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 favourable 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 epic cinema, and there is little 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 2,000-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 productions were tremendous successes with their audiences, but injured Martin’s reputation. In addition to being a painter, he was also a mezzotint engraver and for significant periods of time, earned more from his engravings than his paintings. In 1823 he was commissioned by the American publisher Samuel Prowett to illustrate Milton’s Paradise Lost, for which he was paid 2,000 pounds. However, before the first 24 engravings were completed, he was paid a further 1,500 pounds for a second set of 24 engravings on smaller plates. Two of the more notable prints include Pandemonium and Satan Presiding at the Infernal Council, remarkable for the sci-fi element visible in the architecture. Prowett issued 4 separate editions of the engravings in monthly installments, the first appearing on 20 March 1825 and the last in 1827. Between 1831 and 1835, Martin published his own illustrations to the Old Testament, but the project was a serious drain on his resources and unprofitable. He sold his remaining stock to Charles Tilt, who republished them in a folio album in 1838 and in a smaller format in 1839. Martin’s profile got an unwelcome boost in February 1829 when his older brother, the Non-Conformist Jonathan Martin deliberately set fire to York Minster. The conflagration caused extensive damage and the scene was likened by an onlooker to John Martin’s work, oblivious of the fact that the event had rather more to do with the Martin family than anyone could have predicted. Jonathan Martin’s defence at his trial was paid for with John’s money. The older brother, known as ‘Mad Martin’, was found guilty, but spared the hangman’s noose on the grounds of insanity. A man of diverse interests, Martin’s 1834 plans for London’s sewerage system anticipated by 25 years the 1859 scheme of Joseph Bazalgette to create intercepting sewers complete with walkways along both banks of the River Thames. During the last four years of his life, Martin was engaged upon a triptych of large biblical subjects: The Last Judgment, The Great Day of His Wrath, and The Plains of Heaven. The paintings were bequeathed to Tate in 1974. On 17 February 1854 Martin was stricken with an attack of paralysis whilst painting and died on the Isle of Man. Martin’s posthumous reputation fell victim to changes in fashion and public taste. In the 1930s, his vast paintings fetched only a pound or two, while today, they are valued in the many thousands.