In 1950, Hampton rented a garage on 7th street in northwest Washington. Over the next 14 years, Hampton built a complex work of religious art inside the garage with various scavenged materials such as aluminum and gold foil, old furniture, pieces of
cardboard,
light bulbs, jelly jars, shards of mirror and
desk blotters held together with tacks, glue, pins and tape.
[5]
The complete work consists of a total of 180 objects, many of them inscribed with quotes from the
Book of Revelation. The centerpiece of the exhibit is a throne, seven-feet tall, built on the foundation of an old maroon-cushioned
armchair with the words "Fear Not" at its crest. The throne is flanked by dozens of
altars, crowns, lecterns, tablets and winged
pulpits.
[7]The objects on the right side of the central throne appear to refer to the
New Testamentand
Jesus; and those on the left side to the
Old Testament and
Moses.
[8] Wall plaques on the left bear the name of apostles and those on the right list various biblical patriarchs and prophets such as
Abraham and
Ezekiel.
[9] The text The Throne of the Third Heaven of the Nations' Millennium General Assembly was written on the objects in Hampton's handwriting.
Hampton described his work as a monument to Jesus in Washington.
[2] It was made based on several religious visions that prompted him to prepare for
Christ's return to earth. Hampton wrote that
God visited him often, Moses appeared to him in 1931, the
Virgin Mary in 1946 and
Adam on the day of
President Truman's inauguration in 1949.
[7] The term "third heaven" is based on scriptures that refer to it as the "heaven of heavens" or God's realm.
[10]
The work is based on biblical prophecies of the millennium, including
St. John's vision of God seated on a silver and gold throne surrounded by angels, references to
judgement day, the crowns to be worn by the saved and other events described in Revelations.
[11] The work also has an affiliation with African-American yard shows as well as altars used in African-derived New World religions such as
voodou,
Santeria, and
Candomble[12] Art critic
Robert Farris Thompson describes the Throne as "a unique fusion of biblical and Afro-American traditional imagery".
[13]
The work is associated with the American
Millenarian and
Dispensationalism movements of the 19th and 20th century. These movements divided the history of God's interactions with humanity into seven phases or dispensations, the last of which would be the "Millennium".
[13]
