This exhibition focuses on the conflict, martyrdom and catastrophe found in history painting from the eighteenth century to the present day. In England, history painting first emerged in the eighteenth century.
Artists such as John Singleton Copley (1738–1815) and Benjamin West (1738–1820) presented recent British battles and deaths in the grandest possible manner and depicted scenes from ancient history to remind viewers of the timeless virtues to which they should aspire.
![Masterpiece [Re]discovery 2022. Photo: Ben Fisher Photography, courtesy of Masterpiece London](http://www.apollo-magazine.com/wp-content/uploads/2022/07/MPL2022_4263.jpg)
Suzanne Valadon’s shifting gaze