The Great Red Dragon and the Woman Clothed with the Sun

c. 1805

William Blake

Artist, British, 1757 - 1827

A winged woman, painted with tones of pale and butter yellow, kneels on a rock and looks up at a winged, horned creature with steel-gray skin and a curling tail flying above her in this vertical, graphite and watercolor work on paper. The woman, her body facing us, takes up most of the bottom half of the composition, and the winged creature the top half. The woman’s long blond hair flies up around her upturned face like stylized rays of sunlight. Her arms are spread wide, wrists flexed so her palms face out, and her pale, apricot-colored wings curve up over her shoulders and tuck behind her in a heart shape. She rests on a crescent moon with the tips pointing upward, which, in turn, rests on a gray, squared rock. Mirroring her pose but flying so his body faces downward as his feet point away from us, the creature above the woman has a muscular, humanoid physique. His long tail curls to our left in three loops, and is shaded with pale maroon red. Ram’s horns curve up from inside a golden crown encircling the top of his head, which faces us. Upon closer inspection, several faces, drawn with graphite and filled with nickel-gray watercolor, are connected around the creature's neck and also look down in profile onto the woman. The profiles overlap and some of the heads have moss-green, curling horns. The tips of the flying creature's outstretched fingers and arms nearly touch the sides of the paper and his light, rose-colored bat-like wings extend off both sides and the top of the composition. The background behind the pair is dark gray with white zigzagging lines to the left and right of the woman. Faces also emerge from the ground, looking up from the lower right corner. The artist signed his initials in black paint near the lower left: “WB.”

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Artwork overview

  • Medium

    pen and gray ink with watercolor over graphite

  • Credit Line

    Rosenwald Collection

  • Dimensions

    Overall: 40.8 x 33.7 cm (16 1/16 x 13 1/4 in.)
    support: 55.2 x 44.2 cm (21 3/4 x 17 3/8 in.)

  • Accession

    1943.3.8999

  • Catalogue Raisonné

    Butlin 1981, no. 520

Artwork history & notes

Provenance

Collection Butts. Collection Robson. Collection Newton. Lessing J. Rosenwald (Lugt Supp.1760b); gift 1943 to NGA.

Associated Names

Exhibition History

1943

  • Selections from the Rosenwald Collection, National Gallery of Art, Washington, DC, 1943-1944, pp. 100-101, repro.

1953

  • Flight, Fantasy, Faith, Fact: A Loan Exhibition Commemorating the Fiftieth Anniversary of Powered Flight, Dayton Art Institute, OH, 1953-1954, no. 90.

1957

  • The Art of William Blake, National Gallery of Art, Washington, D.C., 1957, no. 14.

1961

  • Nineteenth Century Master Drawings, The Newark Museum, NJ, 1961, no. 1, repro.

1973

  • The Apocalypse, University of Maryland Art Gallery, College Park, 1973, no. 32, repro.

1987

  • English Drawings and Watercolors, 1630-1850, National Gallery of Art, Washington, DC, 1987-1988, no cat.

1997

  • Six Centuries/Six Artists, National Gallery of Art, Washington, 1997.

1999

  • The Apocalypse and the Shape of Things to Come, British Museum, London, 1999, p. 254 (no. 29).

2002

  • La peinture comme crime, Museé du Louvre, Paris, 2001-2002, 112-114, 346 n. 10, 358, no. 71.

2006

  • The Artist's Vision: Romantic Traditions in Great Britain, National Gallery of Art, Washington, D.C., 2006 - 2007

Bibliography

1943

  • Mongan, Elizabeth. Selections from the Rosenwald Collection, National Gallery of Art. Washington, 1943: 101, repro.

1956

  • Walker, John. National Gallery of Art, Washington. New York, 1956: 12-13, repro.

1960

  • Cooke, Hereward Lester. British Painting in the National Gallery of Art. Washington, D.C., 1960 (Booklet Number Eight in Ten Schools of Painting in the National Gallery of Art, Washington, D.C.): 36, color repro.

1962

  • Cairns, Huntington, and John Walker, eds. Treasures from the National Gallery of Art. New York, 1962: 138, color repro.

1966

  • Cairns, Huntington, and John Walker, eds. A Pageant of Painting from the National Gallery of Art. 2 vols. New York, 1966: 2:362, color repro.

1975

  • Fine 1975, IV.A.13.

1978

  • Butlin, Martin. William Blake. Exh. cat. Tate Gallery, London, 1978: 187.

1981

  • Butlin, Martin. The Paintings and Drawings of William Blake. New Haven: Yale University Press, 1981.

1982

  • Fine, Ruth E. Lessing J. Rosenwald: Tribute to a Collector. Washington, DC: National Gallery of Art, 1982, p. 78, fig. 16-18c.

1984

  • Walker, John. National Gallery of Art, Washington. Rev. ed. New York, 1984: 677, no. 1086, color repro.

1992

  • National Gallery of Art, Washington. Washington, D.C., 1992: 322, repro.

1993

  • Studies in Romanticism 32, The Graduate School, Boston University, (Summer 1993): cover illustration.

  • World Tour (A review of worldwide business and technology news published by Dun and Bradstreet software), 3(January-March 1993).

1996

  • Woodard, Russell Main. Revelation--A Spiritual Study. Silver Spring, 1996: repro.

1997

  • Richler, Martha. National Gallery of Art, Washington: A World of Art. London, 1997: 112, fig. 5.

1998

  • Denny, Don. "Apocalypse." In Encyclopedia of Comparative Iconography: Themes Depicted in Works of Art. Edited by Helene E. Roberts. 2 vols. Chicago, 1998: 2:43

2002

  • Smith, Elise Lawton. Evelyn Pickering De Morgan and the Allegorical Body. Madison, 2002: fig. 76.

Inscriptions

lower left: WB inv; lower right on mount in copperplate hand: Revns: [ch th 14th?]; across top: The Devil is Come Down; across bottom: And ... Serpent.

Wikidata ID

Q64636356

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