Roger Wagner exhibition at Auckland Palace
Retrospective at Bishop Auckland brings more than 20 paintings - including two rarely seen together - to the North East
A major exhibition by artist and poet Roger Wagner is open in Bishop Auckland, bringing together more than four decades of work in a rare survey of the acclaimed painter’s career.
Roger Wagner: The Seeds of Eternity is on show at the Bishop Trevor Gallery inside Auckland Palace (aka Auckland Castle) until the end of the year.
Presented by The Auckland Project, the exhibition features more than 20 paintings spanning Wagner’s artistic life, alongside sketches, studies and examples of his poetry.
Many of the works have not been exhibited together since 1994.
At the centre of the show are two of Wagner’s most celebrated paintings - Menorah (1993) and The Harvest is the End of the World and the Reapers are Angels (1989).
The exhibition marks the first time the pair have been displayed together in more than 30 years and the first time they have been shown side by side in northern England.
Wagner has long been recognised for his distinctive visual language, which blends biblical narratives with contemporary landscapes. His work frequently juxtaposes Christian imagery with modern industrial settings or scenes from the English countryside, encouraging viewers to reflect on the spiritual and the everyday.
The exhibition traces the evolution of his practice from early works such as Ash Wednesday (1982), inspired by T. S. Eliot’s poem of the same name, to the large-scale canvases that have defined his later career. Paintings from his Out of the Whirlwind series, based on the Book of Job, are also included alongside works depicting the Old Testament story of Elijah.
Displayed with preparatory sketches and studies, the exhibition also offers insight into the artist’s creative process, while a selection of his poetry, including a sonnet written in response to The Harvest is the End of the World and the Reapers are Angels, accompanies the paintings.
Clare Baron, head of curatorial at The Auckland Project, said: “Roger Wagner’s paintings are both timeless and startlingly immediate. In The Seeds of Eternity, we wanted to bring together works that reveal the development of his artistic vision - from intimate early studies to the monumental canvases that have defined his career. Wagner invites us to look again at landscapes and stories we think we know - it’s a powerful and deeply resonant experience.”
Robert Wagner added: “Throughout the exhibition we have placed large finished pictures alongside the early fumbling images that gave rise to them (and some of the poems that became entwined with them), to illustrate my conviction that imagination is a path that can lead us to truth and that following it we may find (in Thomas Traherne’s phrase) ‘the seeds of eternity sparkling in our natures’.”
The exhibition runs at Auckland Palace until December 31, 2026.