Mark Wallinger is a deserving winner of the 2007 Turner Prize, having beaten Zarina Bhimji, Nathan Coley and Mike Nelson.
Most artists, faced with the scale of the war in Iraq, have turned away. Wallinger, faced with the same topic, turned to Brian Haw, who the artist has dubbed 'the last protestor'.
Wallinger completed a 40 metre long reconstruction of Haw's Parliament Square protest, including photographs, cartoons, toys, home-made banners and a Banksy original. The reconstruction cost �90,000, and was based on a series of digital images the artist took days before police destroyed the protest.
Wallinger, born in 1959, is the oldest artist to win the Turner Prize. Born in Chigwell, Essex he studied at Chelsea School of Art and Goldsmiths College, where he was also a tutor. He was previously nominated for the Turner Prize in 1995.
He is perhaps previously best known for Ecco Homo, a statue of Christ which was the first work to fill the empty plinth in Trafalgar Square.
The war in Iraq may be the biggest subject facing artists today,and the huge scale has made it almost impossible for artists to tackle. Wallinger, taking one man's reaction to the war, has reduced it to a domestic scale - and made one of the most powerful works of art of modern times.
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