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ON THIS MONTH: ART Treasure in the broom cupboard EW Tristram’s forgotten panels “What is that?” asked Alex Grey, who went to inspect a secret mural hidden away in St Elisabeth’s Church in Eastbourne, and has ended up organising the exhibition of a different but equally intriguing work of art. Being shown round the place by the church’s resident artist Fenya Sharkey, the Martyrs’ Gallery curator spotted what looked like an Italian quattrocento panel, leaning against the wall. St Elisabeth's was completed in 1938, and is Grade II listed. The description of the building in the British Listed Building archives describes, in the basement, an ‘important painted mural sequence, depicting the Pilgrim’s Progress in a free expression style by Hans Feibusch, 1944’. This is the artwork Alex went there to see, a painting which is under threat as the building, left derelict since 2003 when it was discovered to be of unsound structure, is soon to be knocked down. What she didn’t account for was the existence of another masterpiece, which had recently been rediscovered: eleven 6x3-foot painted panels, signed ‘EW Tristram, 1938’. Tristram was a revered art historian and restoration expert, whose watercolour copies of hundreds of British medieval church frescoes are kept in the V&A Museum. These panels are the only originally conceived works he is known to have done: eleven scenes from the life of Christ, very much in the style of the medieval Italian masters. These had been placed around the Sanctuary of the church, but some time after the building’s listing in 1993 had been put away in a cupboard otherwise used for storing cleaning materials, and forgotten. Alex has arranged for all eleven panels to be displayed in the Martyrs’ Gallery in the run-up to Christmas: I meet her there to talk about the exhibition, and she’s clearly excited. “Some members of the 20th Century Society had been to St Elisabeth’s shortly before me to see the Feibusch murals and had also, by chance, seen the recently discovered paintings,” she says. “They had just compiled a list of the ‘top 100 works of British art in the 20th century’, and they said that if they had known about the Tristram panels, they would have put them in the top ten.” It’s remarkable, then, that the panels had disappeared without anyone seemingly missing them; Alex jumped at the chance to display them at Martyrs’. The exhibition will be free to visit, but she’ll make it clear that donations will be welcome, and proceeds will go to the St Elisabeth’s church fund, aiming to raise enough cash to facilitate the moving of the Feibusch murals – a delicate and expensive task – from the basement of the church to a new home before the building is demolished. “I’m glad that people coming to see one artwork from St Elisabeth’s will be able to help save another,” she concludes; there will be a series of ticketed events connected with the exhibition. Alex Leith Martyrs’ Gallery Nov 4th – Dec 17th (private view Fri 3rd Nov, 6pm) check out martyrs.gallery for related events. The Flight into Egypt, EW Tristram, 1938 55