Oil paint on canvas
Tate Collection
Works with images
General Collection
Chantrey Bequest
Collection
<a href="https://www.tate.org.uk/art/artists/sir-stanley-spencer-1977" aria-label="More by Sir Stanley Spencer" data-gtm-name="header_link_artist" data-gtm-destination="page--artist">Sir Stanley Spencer</a>
Resurrection Port Glasgow
Presented by the Trustees of the Chantrey Bequest 1950
actions: expressive
actions: postures and motions
actions: processes and functions
adults
agriculture, gardening & fishing
animals: features
architecture
baby
book - non-specific
boy
children
climbing
contemplation
couple
crawling
crouching
crowd
embracing
emotions and human qualities
emotions, concepts and ideas
family
family
figure
flower
garden structures
girl
grave
grave digger
gravestone / tomb
graveyard
groups
hand / hands raised
Inverclyde
Judaeo-Christian imagery
kissing
lawn
leisure and pastimes
looking / watching
looking up
love
male
man
man, old
military
miracle
nudes
objects
people
places
plants and flowers
Port Glasgow
public service
pushing
reading
reading, writing, printed matter
reclining
recreational activities
religion and belief
religious and ceremonial
resurrection
sailor
Scotland
sex and relationships
shell
society
spade
standing
tenderness
townscapes / man-made features
UK cities, towns and villages
UK counties
UK countries and regions
universal religious imagery
washing / drying
woman
work and occupations
worship
<p>This painting is set in the cemetery in Scottish town of Port Glasgow. It shows the Resurrection, the Christian belief that at the end the world, everyone who has ever existed will be brought back to life. Local people climb out of their graves, greet one another and raise their hands in ecstatic gratitude. Spencer was inspired to create it when he chanced upon the hill-side cemetery. He was in Port Glasgow to paint the shipyards at work as an official war artist during the Second World War.</p><p><em>Gallery label, August 2019</em></p>
painting oil paint canvas
The Resurrection: Port Glasgow
support: 2146 × 6655 mm
Presented by the Trustees of the <a href="/search?gid=999999977" data-gtm-name="tombstone_link_bequest" data-gtm-destination="list-page--search-results">Chantrey Bequest</a> 1950
<div class="text">
<p>This painting is set in the cemetery in Scottish town of Port Glasgow. It shows the Resurrection, the Christian belief that at the end the world, everyone who has ever existed will be brought back to life. Local people climb out of their graves, greet one another and raise their hands in ecstatic gratitude. Spencer was inspired to create it when he chanced upon the hill-side cemetery. He was in Port Glasgow to paint the shipyards at work as an official war artist during the Second World War.</p>
</div>

Display caption
2019-08-13T00:00:00
display-caption
DISPLAY_CAPTION
<p><b>N05961</b> THE RESURRECTION: PORT GLASGOW 1947–50</p>
<p> </p>
<p>Not inscribed.
<br/>Canvas, 84 1/2×262 (215×665).
<br/>Chantrey Purchase from the artist 1950.
<br/><i>Exh:</i> R.A., 1950 (557), as ‘The Resurrection’; Tate Gallery, November–December 1955 (74).
<br/><i>Lit:</i> <i>Britain To-Day</i>, July 1950, pp.36–7; <i>Resurrection Pictures (1945–50)</i>, 1951, pp.2–4, 6–10, repr. pls.2–4 and cover (details), all in colour; <i>Studio</i>, CXLVII, 1954, p.37; John Rothenstein, <i>Modern British Painters: Lewis to Moore</i>, 1956, pp.193–8; Collis, 1962, pp.193–9, 211–12, 215, 224, 247.</p>
<p>This work, painted between 1947 and 1950, is the last of a series of eight on the theme of the Resurrection. The inspiration for these came to the artist whilst working on his shipyard pictures at Port Glasgow in 1943–4. One evening he chanced upon a hill-side cemetery during his walks in the town and was prompted to begin a number of <a class="glossarylinktopopup" data-gtm-destination="article-page" data-gtm-name="body_text_link" href="http://www.tate.org.uk/learn/online-resources/glossary/d/drawing" title="Glossary definition for 'Drawing'"><span>drawings</span></a> for a large picture of the Resurrection, which he envisaged as taking place in the cemetery, the resurrected persons climbing the cemetery hill, which became the Hill of Sion. The people of the shipyards and the shipyard town were therein to be ‘redeemed’; they would have their apotheosis. As the practical difficulties of <a class="glossarylinktopopup" data-gtm-destination="article-page" data-gtm-name="body_text_link" href="http://www.tate.org.uk/learn/online-resources/glossary/p/painting" title="Glossary definition for 'Painting'"><span>painting</span></a> a single huge picture proved too great, he decided to use the drawings in a series of interrelated pictures each with three or five <a class="glossarylinktopopup" data-gtm-destination="article-page" data-gtm-name="body_text_link" href="http://www.tate.org.uk/learn/online-resources/glossary/p/panel" title="Glossary definition for 'Panel'"><span>panels</span></a> and each with separate existence -though all could, if circumstances permitted, be eventually combined. The artist has written detailed notes on many of these paintings in <i>Stanley Spencer: Resurrection Pictures (1945–1950)</i>, 1951.</p>
<p><a class="acno-pop" data-gtm-destination="page--artwork" data-gtm-name="body_text_link" href="https://www.tate.org.uk/art/artworks/spencer-the-resurrection-port-glasgow-n05961" title="View the details of this artwork"><span>N05961</span></a> was intended to go below ‘The Hill of Sion’ and is divided into the following main groups, reading from left to right: ‘(1) the book-group and sailor-group (2) the granite-lid-raising group (3) the table-tomb (centre) group (4) the hands-raised-ecstasy group (5) the girl-helped-from-grave group together with the grave-digger who calmly surveys the whole scene’ (<i>op. cit.</i>, p.10).</p>
<p>The remaining paintings of the series depict ‘Reunion of Families’ (1945), ‘Waking Up’ (1945), ‘Tidying’ (1945), ‘Reunion’ (1945), ‘The Resurrection with Raising of Jairus’ Daughter' (1947), ‘Rejoicing’ and ‘The Hill of Sion’ (1946).</p>
<p><b>Published in:</b>
<br/>Mary Chamot, Dennis Farr and Martin Butlin, <i>The Modern British Paintings, Drawings and <a class="glossarylinktopopup" data-gtm-destination="article-page" data-gtm-name="body_text_link" href="http://www.tate.org.uk/learn/online-resources/glossary/s/sculpture" title="Glossary definition for 'Sculpture'"><span>Sculpture</span></a></i>, London 1964, II
<br/></p>

Catalogue entry
2004-10-08T00:00:00
catalogue-entry
CATALOGUE_ENTRY
actions: expressive actions: postures and motions actions: processes and functions adults agriculture, gardening & fishing animals: features architecture baby book - non-specific boy children climbing contemplation couple crawling crouching crowd embracing emotions and human qualities emotions, concepts and ideas family family figure flower garden structures girl grave grave digger gravestone / tomb graveyard groups hand / hands raised Inverclyde Judaeo-Christian imagery kissing lawn leisure and pastimes looking up looking / watching love male man man, old military miracle nudes objects people places plants and flowers Port Glasgow public service pushing reading reading, writing, printed matter reclining recreational activities religion and belief religious and ceremonial resurrection sailor Scotland sex and relationships shell society spade standing tenderness townscapes / man-made features UK cities, towns and villages UK counties UK countries and regions universal religious imagery washing / drying woman work and occupations worship