September 29 is Michaelmas, the Western Christian Feast of St. Michael and All Angels. Long significant in Britain as one of the traditional quarter days—when rents and contracts were often settled—it also marked the turn from harvest into autumn.
At Trinity College Chapel, Cambridge, the feast finds a monumental visual counterpart in Benjamin West’s St. Michael Binding Satan, the vast painting above the high altar.
West, an American-born artist who made his career in London, was a Founder member of the Royal Academy, its second president, and George III’s official history painter. The altarpiece was given to Trinity by Dr. John Hinchliffe, the College’s Master from 1768 to 1789.
The painting draws on the biblical image of Michael’s victory over the devil, transforming the chapel’s east end into a scene of divine judgment and triumph. West presents the archangel through idealized, monumental figure design and dynamic movement, combining the theatrical scale of history painting with the devotional purpose of an altarpiece.
Set within an early-eighteenth-century Neo-Classical wooden reredos, the work makes a fitting focal point for Michaelmas: a visual drama of heavenly order overcoming evil and darkness.
Image credit: St. Michael Binding Satan, Benjamin West, Trinity College Chapel, Cambridge.
