THE Tate gallery, once at the heart of the cool Britannia movement, has turned on Tony Blair over the Iraq war.

Sir Nicholas Serota, the gallery’s director, has given the go-ahead for an installation that mounts a strident attack on the government’s foreign policy and its attempts to curb freedom of speech.

The work, which will be unveiled tomorrow, is inspired by the ramshackle encampment of Brian Haw, the Parliament Square peace protester.

Festooned with slogans attacking Blair and Gordon Brown, its centrepiece is a representation of Haw apparently being martyred. It shows an image of him fastened to a wooden cross wearing a T-shirt emblazoned with the word “Bliar”.

The decision to exhibit the new work by the sculptor Mark Wallinger is further evidence of the extent to which the arts establishment has abandoned new Labour.

This week Channel 4 and More 4 will broadcast The Trial of Tony Blair, a drama that shows the prime minister hauled before a tribunal in the Hague in 2010 to answer for the allegedly illegal war in Iraq. It is written by Alistair Beaton, a satirist and former speechwriter for Brown.

In 1997, when Blair came to power, new Labour saw contemporary artists such as Damien Hirst and Tracey Emin as useful in its project to “modernise” Britain. Serota gave the prime minister a private tour at the opening of the Tate Modern gallery in 2000.

Wallinger’s installation is something of a departure for the artist, who has not been so explicit in his criticisms of government in the past. His best– known work is Ecce Homo, a statue of Christ on one of the plinths in Trafalgar Square.

The new work, entitled State Britain, consists of posters, boards, photographs, peace flags and metal crash barriers. It resembles the pavement picket from where Haw has been haranguing parliament through his megaphone since 2001.

Haw’s camp, a few minutes’ walk from Tate Britain, is only a fraction of its former size after a night-time raid last May by police, who removed many placards. This followed the introduction of the Serious Organised Crime and Police Act, which restricts demonstrations around parliament on the grounds that terrorists might use them for cover.

Haw, 57, said this weekend he did not know about the Tate project but agreed his protest was worthy of artistic attention. “I’d be interested to see it, but I have to say, the artist would have to be very good to do it justice. What we had (before it was reduced in size) were pieces of art, so I can understand it. It inspired awe.”

The Tate work also includes a painting with the grinning faces of Blair, Brown and Jack Straw with bowls labelled “Iraq” and washing their hands like Pilate; a placard carrying the words “Beep for Brian”; and a banner quoting Benjamin Franklin, one of America’s founding fathers, saying: “There never was a good war or a bad peace.”

Wallinger, who has described his work as showing the “politics of representation and the representation of politics”, also includes a poster calling for a “salute” to the late Ann Clancy, who was arrested in August 2005 for an unauthorised protest near parliament.

The installation will remain in Tate Britain’s Duveen galleries until August.

Some clues to Wallinger’s anti-war preoccupation were seen last month at an art fair in Florida. American collectors were bemused by a piece by the artist, priced at £75,000, depicting the stars and stripes but with a 51st star. Asked whether the extra state was Puerto Rico, his dealer Anthony Reynolds replied: “England, I’m afraid.”

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