Rodney Matthews

One of my favorite paintings by Matthews, be sure to explore more of his artwork at his official site.

The Pilgrim's Progress



Greatheart and His Fellows Attack the Monster


The above illustrations were taken from John Bunyan's "The Pilgrim's Progress" originally published in 1678. The illustrations were taken from editions dating between 1851, 1880 and 1930.

James Gleeson
"Since the 1970s Gleeson has generally made large scale paintings in keeping with the surrealist Inscape genre. The works outwardly resemble rocky seascapes, although in detail the coastline's geological features are found to be made of giant molluscs and threatening crustacae. In keeping with the Freudian principles of surrealism these grotesque, nightmarish compositions symbolise the inner workings of the human mind. Called 'Psychoscapes' by the artist, they show liquid, solid and air coming together and directly allude to the interface between the conscious, subconscious and unconscious mind." - quote source.

Daniel’s Vision of the Four Beasts

Vision Of The Four Beasts by Gustave Doré.


"Luther-Bibel 1545: Daniel 7,2-8"

Matthäus Merian - Engraving from "Icones Biblicae" 1630.
















The fourth beast as shown on this site.


Daniel 7:3 - van Haecht


From The Antiquae urbis splendor ('The splendour of the ancient city') a book of engravings on the monuments and other antiquities of ancient Rome. Created by Giacomo Lauro, Rome 1612.


I lost track of the origins of this print but it does appear to play upon the imagery of the four beasts.

"1 And I saw a beast rising out of the sea, with ten horns and seven heads, with ten diadems on its horns and blasphemous names on its heads. 2 And the beast that I saw was like a leopard; its feet were like a bear’s, and its mouth was like a lion’s mouth. And to it the dragon gave his power and his throne and great authority. 3 One of its heads seemed to have a mortal wound, but its mortal wound was healed, and the whole earth marveled as they followed the beast. 4 And they worshiped the dragon, for he had given his authority to the beast, and they worshiped the beast, saying, “Who is like the beast, and who can fight against it?” (Revelation 13:1-4 ESV)"

Does anyone know where I could find larger examples of the woodcuts shown at the bottom of this page?

The Johannes Apocalypse In Classical Comics









These are some of the bizarre creature infested prints featured in this gallery. You can see more prints from the Apocalypse here.

Franz Gaul - Demons







These costume designs by Gaul date back to 1837. There are over one thousand costume designs by Gaul in this gallery.

Temptation of Saint Anthony





















Here's another fantastic depiction of the Temptation of Saint Anthony dated at 1520, I couldn't make out the artist responsible. A larger black and white version can be seen below.

Matthias Gerung





















Here's another woodcut print (Satire auf den Ablaß) or "Satire of the Catholic Religiousness" dated at 1536. Below is a colorized version of this work.






















The woodcut below by Gerung is titled "The Roman Clergy In Hell" from 1540.

Erhard Schon
The above woodcut print is dated at 1525. The original title in German is "Jagd auf Mönche und Pfaffen" which translates to "Hunt for monks and Pfaffen." I've posted this print of the devil with bagpipes on here before.

Here is a short bio on the artist..

"German woodcut designer and painter. He was the son of Marx Schön III, a minor Nuremberg painter, with whom he probably began his training. Then he studied Albrecht Dürer's prints while living in the artist's house for several years. Scholars have attributed some 1,200 illustrations for 116 books and about 200 separate woodcuts to Erhard Schön, making him one of the era's most prolific woodblock designers. His works enjoyed tremendous popularity." - quote source.

Creation Of Good And Bad Angels
This French miniature painting is from "the beginning of Book 4 in the Livre des anges."

Image found here.

Priamo della Quercia - Dante's Inferno









These paintings are from the Inferno and Purgatory sections of Dante's Divine Comedy and were created between 1442 and 1450. Click here to see more paintings from this illuminated manuscript.

Prehistoric Monsters at the Crystal Palace


The following 2 artworks aren't from the Crystal Palace but I wanted to show them anyway.

"When the Palace transferred to Penge in 1854, Joseph Paxton was determined to make it an unrivalled attraction.

As part of this plan "dinosaur islands" were created in the park lakes upon which huge models of the long extinct creatures were constructed, many only recently discovered and of great topical interest.

Sculptured by Benjamin Waterhouse Hawkins, models of extinct mammals as well as dinosaurs were included." - quote source.

This page has a fantastic array of artwork related to the dinosaurs from the Crystal palace.
There's a great collection of articles concerning the early discoveries of dinosaur species here. The first chapater discusses the Crystal Castle dinosaurs here and here.
To see a photos of the actual dinosaur sculptures, click here.
Read more about this attraction here.

And here is one more illustration of prehistoric monsters by one of my favorite artists, John Martin. This is a mezzotint with the description, "A nocturnal scene with saurians and sea-creatures fighting each other in the water."