Tuesday, June 06, 2006

John Martin's "Paradise Lost"
John Martin's "Paradise Lost" mezzotint etching series is one of the most interesting visions of Hell. The vast cavernous landscapes with giant ancient architecture makes Hell out to be a place I'd really like to visit. His glowing white figures against darkened backgrounds creates a very strange dream like vision. His depiction of the Fall of Babylon is one of my favorite works of his. Be sure to click on the image here to see additional details of the mezzotint etching.

2 comments:

Robert Adam Gilmour said...

Great gallery but it was missing my favourite Martin image.... http://www.wga.hu/art/m/martin/deluge1.jpg

Aeron said...

Nice. I was lucky enough to see his "Paradise Lost" etching series in person about 5 years ago. I found them hidden away in a small room on the second floor of the Indianapolis Museum of Art. I remember them being smaller than I expected but the detail really was amazing. There was an original Hieronymus Bosch and a couple of Bosch imitations dated at around 1600? That I spent many hours standing in front of studying. The guards probably thought I was insane!