Joshua Commanding the Sun to Stand Still upon Gibeon

John Martin's Joshua Commanding the Sun to Stand Still upon Gibeon from 1816 is a defining work of the Romantic sublime, depicting the biblical miracle in which God halted the heavens at Joshua's command to allow the Israelites to complete their victory. Martin specialized in apocalyptic landscapes of vast scale and dramatic lighting that thrilled popular audiences while scandalizing academic critics. His paintings were among the most widely reproduced images of the Romantic era.

Martin's oil-on-canvas technique creates a landscape of immense scale through extreme contrasts of light and darkness and vertiginous spatial recession. The tiny figures dwarfed by cosmic events and the dramatic burst of celestial light demonstrate his mastery of the Romantic sublime.