In this second tapestry, Perry deepens his engagement with working-class culture articulating it through a complex network of art historical references. Both the title and composition draw on Giovanni Bellini’s The Agony in the Garden (c. 1465) while the central grouping recalls Matthias Grünewald’s Isenheim Altarpiece (1512–16). This places Perry’s contemporary story within the art history canon giving it authority and a sense of lasting importance.

The scene is set on a hillside outside Sunderland with Tim’s stepfather occupying centre stage as a singer in a working men’s club. Behind him stands a crane, which formally replaces the cross, and extends the work’s reference to the pride in Sunderland’s industrial past. Tim’s mother appears on the left in the role of a raptured Mary Magdalene, while Tim is positioned to the right dressed in a grammar school uniform, a form of schooling associated with upward mobility, and with his hands pressed over his ears. This gesture signals his growing discomfort and an emerging distance from his working-class roots.