Jacob and his Angels
Jacob Epstein was a controversial artist who introduced new aesthetics and challenged British attitudes
Epstein’s sculpture of Jacob and the Angel is a larger-than-life depiction of Jacob’s all-night struggle with an unknown assailant who finally revealed himself in the morning as an Angel of God, blessing Jacob for his courage and resistance, giving Jacob a new name: Israel — ‘one who struggles with God’.
There’s no doubt that this Bible story, from the book of Genesis, resonated deeply with Epstein. Not least because his own first name was Jacob, and he was a Jew. The two-tonne sculpture, completed in 1940, documents Epstein’s continued fascination with Biblical tales and how they related to contemporary events. At the time, Britain was engaged in its own gargantuan struggle, standing alone against Nazi invasion, until America joined the war in 1941. This defining struggle seems reflected in the gigantic, visceral sculpture.
The grappling figures are angular, monumental. The angel wings are almost abstract, retaining the shape of the original huge block of alabaster from which it is carved. The proportions emphasise weight. The wrestling pose is a semi-erotic embrace between angel and man — the figure of an exhausted Jacob is supported by the Angel. Each figure partially obscures the…
