Journal

17 July 2025

Introducing the Crucible of Light Multimedia Art Project

Since I finished my series of historical landscapes of Spain series, I’ve been working hard on the planning for a substantial new project. It tells the story of Europe’s Muslims and Christians in war and peace, from the birth of Islam to the present, through visual art and writing. My aspiration is to transform the negative energies of cultural and religious hostility into reconciliation, respect and understanding between European Muslims and Christians. That aspiration is expressed through the creative work of art and words, conceived and shared as a multimedia public engagement project.

Inspired by Hew Locke’s major installation The Procession and by the work of Anselm Kiefer, Crucible of Light is a procession of paintings and texts, a grand pageant of portraits, historical landscapes and battle scenes that depict the encounters between Christians and Muslims in Europe from the seventh century to the present. The painted spectacle portrays the narrative of my book Crucible of Light: Islam and the forging of Europe from the 8th to the 21st century (Picador, September 2025) in visual form, interspersed with excerpts from the text. In essence it relates the story of my book in oil and mixed media. The project has powerful significance for a general European public in its exploration of the connections between Muslims and Christians, of what brings them together as well as what divides them, and presents a new vision of Europe’s shared cultural and historical identity.

This the first keynote painting in the series, ‘Fall of Roman and Persian empires and the rise of Islam’, which depicts the final great battle between the Roman empire, symbolized by the emperor Heraclius, and the Persian empire represented by Khusro II. It shows the rise of the crescent moon of Islam above the battle scene. Oil and mixed media on board, 48” x 36”

A brand-new portrait of Europe’s first Muslim ruler, Abd al-Rahman I, emir of the Umayyad dynasty in Cordoba in the 8th century. The green tones are suggestive of the emir’s great love of plants and his work as an early environmentalist; the famous horseshoe arch represents his foundation of the Great Mosque of Cordoba, one of the world’s iconic Islamic buildings. This is the first of a pair of portraits of Spain’s earliest Muslim rulers.

November 2025

The second of the pair of portrait of Europe’s first great Muslim rulers. This is Abd al-Rahman III, Europe’s first Caliph, and head of the Umayyad dynasty in Cordoba in the 9-10th century. He is surrounded by images and symbols that represent his magnificent country palace, the famous Madinat al-Zahra, with its zoo of exotic animals, new and rare plants that flourished in the gardens, and the great bowl of mercury in the Caliph’s throne room, which shone and flashed with thunderbolts of light when it was stirred. The metallic copper and gold tones of the painting evoke the radiance of the place, and the caliph’s fabulous wealth and power.

December 2025