The Angel with the Key to the Bottomless Pit

1498

Albrecht Dürer

Artist, German, 1471 - 1528

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Artwork overview

Associated Artworks

See all 15 artworks

Saint Michael Fighting the Dragon

Albrecht Dürer

1498

Created with black lines printed on cream-white paper, a dense crowd of men and women gathers to our left facing a woman riding a dragon-like creature with seven heads to our right, while angels fly overhead in this vertical woodcut. To our right, the woman rides the creature side-saddle, with both legs facing us, but she turns her torso to face the crowd to our left. She holds up a tall, ornate, lidded chalice with her right hand, farther from us, and her other hand rests in her lap. The woman has delicate features, seen almost in profile, and ringlets frame her face. The rest of her hair is pulled up under a jeweled crown, and she wears a pearl necklace. Her bodice is belted at the waist before falling past her feet. Her sleeves are off the shoulder and come to her elbows, and ornaments there could be jewels and more pearls. The creature she rides has talons for the front and back legs, with a plume of feathers and a tapering, snake-like tail at the back. Wings at the beast’s shoulders might be folded under the woman. Each of the seven faces of the creature has a long, serpentine neck with the head of a different animal with horns added, including a goat, bird, camel, and other imaginary animals. To our left, the group is made up of six men and one woman, with the tops of about a dozen hats indicating a crowd beyond. One man stands with his back to us, wearing a turban, a long, fur-lined cloak, and chains and jewels around his neck. Facing us, another man is cleanshaven with a double chin, and he wears a hat cocked to one side. Others wear a long floppy cap, a feathered cap, or monk’s robes. Densely packed slivers of faces and hats are jumbled together beyond, and the spiked blade of a halberd rises above the crowd. The group and creature seem to stand near the edge of a body of water, with plants and rocks scattered around their feet. The water stretches into the distance beyond the creature to a town being consumed by flames, to our right. Two masted ships and a rowboat float in the water near the shoreline, which leads back to distant mountains. Two winged angels with flowing, curly hair appear within coiling, twisting clouds in the sky above. One gestures toward the scene below with arms spread wide and the other holds a disk-like millstone. Also in the sky, to our left and smaller in scale, an armored man riding a horse raises a sword high overhead. Dozens of faces create a second crowd disappearing into the cloud banks beyond the rider. The artist signed the work with a D tucked into the legs of an A at the lower center.

The Whore of Babylon

Albrecht Dürer

1498

The Seven Angels with the Trumpets

Albrecht Dürer

1498

Artwork history & notes

Provenance

Dr. Carl Gaa [1871-c.1925], Mannheim; (his sale, Boerner, 6 May 1926, no. 436); acquired by Félix Somary [1881-1956], Zurich, via Joseph Meder; by descent to heirs of Somary; Gustav Laube; by descent to the heirs of Laube; (August Laube, Zurich); purchased by NGA, 2008.

Associated Names

Bibliography

1932

  • Meder, Joseph. Dürer-Katalog; ein Handbuch über Albrecht Dürers Stiche, Radierungen, Holzschnitte, deren Zustände, Ausgaben und Wasserzeichen. Vienna: Verlag Gilhofer und Ranschburg, 1932. Reprint. New York: Da Capo Press, 1971.

2001

  • Schoch, Rainer, Mattihas Mende, and Anna Scherbaum. Albrecht Dürer: Das druckgraphische Werk. Munich, 2001: vol. 2: no. 126.

Wikidata ID

Q18338547

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