The rest is history

Narrative art that explored religious, mythological, historical or allegorical subjects took a while to become established in Britain, but, when it did, it was in its grandest form, on the largest scale and for a very long time, finds Michael Hall

- Michael Hall

IN 1804, an 18-year-old aspiring artist named Benjamin Robert Haydon arrived in London from his native Plymouth, determined to make a name for himself.

He had an introduction to another Devonian painter, James Northcote, who, on being told that Haydon planned to devote himself to history painting, exclaimed: 'Heestoricaul peinter! Why, yee'll starve with a bundle of straw under yeer head!'

Northcote was not far wrong, although it took several decades for Haydon's tragedy to play itself out: having taken his own life in 1846, his tombstone recorded that: 'He devoted 42 years to the improvement of the taste of the English people in high art and died broken-hearted from pecuniary distress.' Haydon is remembered today for his memoirs and journals, which depict the artistic and social life of Regency and early-Victorian London with unforgettable vividness, and his often vast canvases languish unloved in the storerooms of many museums and galleries.

Yet, he was far from neglected: his portraits of such figures as his friend William Wordsworth were admired and he had a gift for satire in 1827, George IV bought his painting The Mock Election for 500 guineas. But this did not satisfy Haydon, who longed to be recognised as a history painter. His most memorable achievement in the genre is Curtius Leaping into the Gulf, a scene from Livy's history of Rome: in order to appease the gods, Curtius on horseback leapt into a chasm that had opened in the Forum.

Curtius is a self-portrait of Haydon, who, it is implied, was heroically sacrificing himself, in his case in the cause of high art.