by Chris Gollon

‘Magdalene at the Base of the Cross’ by Chris Gollon will be on display at the High Altar for the duration of Lent, which overlaps Women’s History Month in March. It was first shown in Gollon’s national touring exhibition to English cathedrals ‘Incarnation, Mary and Women from the Bible’ (2014 – 2016).

Gollon also brought women to the fore, painting them as modern, feisty, brave women, in his ‘Fourteen Stations of the Cross’, permanently installed in the Grade I listed Church of St John on Bethnal Green, designed by Sir John Soane. In the documentary ‘CHRIS GOLLON: Life in Paint’, to be screened in the Cathedral on 6^th March, Sara Maitland remarks: “I’m an old-style feminist […] trying to bring that sort of feminism into some sort of relationship with the Gospels, and Chris just does it”. Gollon biographer art historian Tamsin Pickeral notes: ‘Magdalene at the Base of the Cross’ “has an increasing earthiness, seen in her muscly, knotted arms and her workmanlike hands. Clearly this is a woman who has toiled, and yet she is also incredibly beautiful.”

Chris Gollon (1953 -2017) was a London-born artist who exhibited widely in the UK. His work is held in public collections including the British Museum. In 2004, he exhibited in St Paul’s Cathedral, with Bill Viola, Maggi Hambling and Tracey Emin in ‘Presence: Images of Christ for the Third Millennium’.  In 2018, Romsey Abbey purchased and permanently installed Gollon’s ‘St Ethelflaeda Diptych’. During Advent 2025, Chris Gollon’s large canvas ‘Virgin & Child’ was re-installed in Guildford Cathedral, on loan from the Chris Gollon Estate.

‘Incarnation, Mary and Women from the Bible’ catalogue, with texts by writers including Sara Maitland and Tamsin Pickeral is available from the Cathedral Shop.