James O'Donnell chooses The Chariot Race by Alexander von Wagner
I had a few hours free in Manchester when I was taking part in a concert in the then new Bridgewater Hall. I decided to spend them in the city art gallery. This painting stopped me in my tracks. I was not expecting to encounter, to be confronted by, anything so thrilling or viscerally exciting.
Partly, it’s the sheer scale. This is an enormous canvas, taking up a whole wall. It overwhelms you and forces you to be part of the scene. You can almost feel the breath and body heat of the huge horses as they hurtle desperately towards you, their drivers racing for their very lives.
The perspective of the painting is brilliant, the figures in the foreground seeming to leap out at you, as the crowds in the huge stadium disappear into the far background.
It’s a painting you can completely lose yourself in. For some reason, I happened to be in the right frame of mind that day and I have never forgotten it.
James O’Donnell is Westminster Abbey’s director of Music and principal conductor of the Abbey Choir
John McEwen comments on The Chariot Race
Alexander von Wagner was Hungarian, born in Pest in 1838, before Pest, Buda and Óbuda united to form Budapest in 1873. After graduating from the Real-Gymnasium in his home town, he entered the Academy of Fine Arts at Vienna, then switched to Munich’s Royal Academy of Fine Arts, where his principal teacher was Prof Karl von Piloty. From 1869 to 1910, Wagner was professor of history painting at the Munich Academy, specialising in history paintings and everyday scenes from contemporary Hungarian life.
The Chariot Race is his most famous work. The first, smaller version of the picture was exhibited in Vienna in 1873. Wagner enlarged it in 1882 and this bigger version was shown at the Chicago Fair in 1893. The enlarged painting seems to have taken due note of the best-selling 1880 novel Ben Hur: A Tale of the Christ by Gen Lew Wallace and surely benefited from the spectacular success of the book, whose author had been a Civil War general and governor of New Mexico Territory, and was later ambassador to Turkey.
Wallace’s novel intertwined the life of Jesus and the fictional Ben Hur, a Jewish prince enslaved by Rome. A story of Christian redemption, it was the most influential Christian book of the 19th century. Recurring film versions, the latest in 2016, have ensured its longevity. It topped the best-seller list again after MGM’s 1959 Hollywood blockbuster — scripted by Gore Vidal and Christopher Fry and starring Charlton Heston as Ben Hur himself — won 11 Oscars.
The chariot race is the most famous scene in book and film. In the book, the chariot wheel is crushed at the height of the race, but Wagner shows it spinning off.
Walking Hadrian's Wall: An epic walk from coast to coast and back in time
One of Britain’s most famous landmarks makes for an epic walk back in time – and it's a journey that
Credit: John Millar / Country Life
'I was 8–1 to be the next Bond just before Daniel Craig got it': Nathaniel Parker on life, acting, and his big near-miss
Nathaniel Parker catches up with Jack Watkins about David Cameron's epic gaffe, and the time he nearly became James Bond.
Credit: Alamy
The life of the oak tree collector: 'You soon see there’s only one sensible course of action: collect the lot'
For tree-loving landowners who want to leave their mark, nothing beats planting your own quercetum. Mark Griffiths celebrates the mighty
-
Country Life's Quiz of the Day, 7 February 2025: 10 head-scratchers to take you into the weekendGuess the house price, remember the stuff you learned at school and take wild stabs in the dark. You'll love it.
-
Seven of the UKs best Art Deco cinemas that help remind us of what we have (wrongly) long stopped expecting from public buildingsFrom the birthplace of modern cinema, to the home of the largest Wurlitzer theatre pipe organ in Europe, the UK’s remaining Art Deco cinemas are flourishing. Here are seven of the best.
-
'As a child I wanted to snuggle up with the dogs and be part of it': Alexia Robinson chooses her favourite paintingAlexia Robinson, founder of Love British Food, chooses an Edwin Landseer classic.
-
The Pre-Raphaelite painter who swapped 'willowy, nubile women' for stained glass — and created some of the best examples in BritainThe painter Edward Burne-Jones turned from paint to glass for much of his career. James Hughes, director of the Victorian Society, chooses a glass masterpiece by Burne-Jones as his favourite 'painting'.
-
'I can’t look away. I’m captivated': The painter who takes years over each portrait, with the only guarantee being that it won't look like the subjectFor Country Life's My Favourite Painting slot, the writer Emily Howes chooses a work by a daring and challenging artist: Frank Auerbach.
-
My Favourite Painting: Rob HouchenThe actor Rob Houchen chooses a bold and challenging Egon Schiele work.
-
My Favourite Painting: Jeremy Clarkson'That's why this is my favourite painting. Because it invites you to imagine'
-
The chair of the National Gallery names his favourite from among the 2,300 masterpieces — and it will come as a bit of a shockAs the National Gallery turns 200, the chair of its board of trustees, John Booth, chooses his favourite painting.
-
'A wonderful reminder of what the countryside could and should be': The 200-year-old watercolour of a world fast disappearingChristopher Price of the Rare Breed Survival Trust on the bucolic beauty of The Magic Apple Tree by Samuel Palmer, which he nominates as his favourite painting.
-
My favourite painting: Andrew Graham-Dixon'Lesson Number One: it’s the pictures that baffle and tantalise you that stay in the mind forever .'
