Artists, Art Discussion and Megasites

Art collections | Individual artists | Iconography | Community of Angels Project | Raphael's ubiquitous cherbus

Art collections

Gustav Doré Gallery, a wonderful resource by an unknown saint. The collected is, however, not correct that "All Artwork displayed on this web page is copyrighted property of Gustave Dore." The images from Paradise Lost are breathtaking.

Figures de la Bible. Published in 1728, with illustrations by Gerard Hoet, and others. This is a wonderful collection of Bible images. Among my favorites are Isaiah's vision of the Lord and six-winged seraphim, Tobias and the fish (okay, I have a Tobit obsession), and a very dramatic depiction of Noah's flood. .[1]Kudos to the University of Oklahoma, Kerry Magruder, Ben Dill and Elizabeth Braker for getting these images online.

Mike's Photo Album, an enormous collection of images, not a few of them of angels. Here Bouguereau has one of his most comprehensive galleries online. And rubbing shoulders with (and acknowledging their kinship) are Boris Vallejo and others of his ilk—painters of women with taut, Californian bodies filling improbable, minimal, leather-and-metal costumes either chained (but still limber and having a good hair day) for some monster, astride a wyvern, or posing like a cheerleader while a horrible beast creeps up. But, hey, if you grew up on Conan paperbacks and Dragon magazine like I did, you'll recognize a lot of these images and, fundamentally, they're a lot of fun.

Durwaigh Gallery. Gorgeous, never-vulgar fantasy art by a number of artists, including Marc Potts, Linda Ravenscroft, David Delamare, John Silver, Ian Daniels, Kinuko Craft, and Amoreno.

World's Great Madonnas is a wonderful repository of dozens of Madonna images collected by Martha Nation. Start with the Found Madonna Image of the Week Archive. Very many of these images contain angels; I thumbnail only those that feature angels very prominently, or feature interesting angels.

Northstar Gallery's Angel Gallery , a gallery of striking galleries of beautiful photographs, most of graveyard angels. "Of Flesh and Stone" juxtaposes black and white photographs of female bodies, real and from graveyard statuary. The gallery also sports an interesting collection, entitled Sirens and Mermaids.

Le Cimeti�re du P�re-Lachaise unoffocial French site has a wonderful collection of angel photos.

Official P�re-Lachaise site, with very spiffy tour.

New Testament water colors by amateur Christians artists in Bogota, Colombia, from World Missions Collection Clipart Graphics. See also their Old Testament water colors.

Angels in the Judaica Art Gallery, part of the larger Judaica Art Gallery from Jewish Heritage Online Magazine

19c. Bible Illustrations by Julius Schnoor von Carolsfeld from World Missions Collection Clipart Graphics. See also page two and three.

Albrecht Durer Apocalypse of St. John (1496-98) Connecticut College's Wetmore Print Collection. Explicitly public domain.

Futuristic Icons by Hannah M. G. Shapero, including Michael, Patron of High Energy Physics (with a stylish Chinese-dragon outfit) and Gabriel, Patron of Electronic Communciations. Shapero, a fellow-Bostonian and Classicist I've never met, has a good scholarly site on Zoroastrianism , and, being an artist, she has also painted The Seven Amesha Spentas, equivalent to archangels. This is all great. I think she is, however, naive on the question Were the Three Magi of the Christmas story really Zoroastrian? [2]

The French site "Les Anges Guardiens" has an excellent collection of angel and guardian angel images. As they warn, "certain carnal depictions of angels can turn Christians away from their veneration."

Joan Kirk's Gallery of Angelic Art has a lot of links to angelic art, much not pictured here. Runs to the sentimental.

British Museum search on "Angels"

Exhibit: "En présence des anges Art religieux et dévotions populaires" held at the Musée des Hospitali�res de l'Hötel-Dieu de Montréal, Canada. Exhibit held a lot of art—from 16th century sculpture to modern guardian angel cards—much of which is also online, but almost universally at very small sizes. Also includes essays (in French) on angels in various religions and in Quebec art.

C. Thomas Law's Virtual Angel Gallery. Some broken.

In the Light of Angels art gallery. Runs to the sentimental.

Angel tattoos. Some day I'll do a whole gallery of these.

Angel gallery at The Drakan Web, which also feaures fairies, "women of fantasy," and so forth.

Individual artists

Sarah Young. I quite fell in love with Sarah Young's prints. See more at her website.

Shadowscapes / Stephanie Pui-Mun Law. Ms. Law has a very distinctive style, to my eye very attractive. One gallery is devoted to angels.

Tarnished Images: Ruth Thompson, striking fantasy art.

The Art of Jeffrey K. Bedrick. Gauzy realism, frequently symbolic.

Echo Chernik. Wonderful, stylish and sexy art nouveau work.

Lawrence A Williams. Highly-polished and attractive angels and dragons.

Angel Illustrations - The Art of K. P. Lines. New and archive galleries full of angels.

Ursula Vernon / www.metalandmagic.com. I am very taken with Ms. Vernon's dragons, angels and particularly griffns.

Anneke Hut on Elfwood, or her homepage.

The Ethereal Visions of Matt Hughes has some truly arresting angels and iconographically similar beings, like his depiction of the Celtic goddess Sirona, as well as faeries and angels.

Carina 'CeL' Larsson (Elfwood) has a number of angels, mermaids, griffins, etc. Also see her homepage.

"S.U.R." Talented Russian surrealist "S.U.R." (Sergei U. Rukavishnikov) has a vivid, disturbing imagination. His "You Can Fly Now" features a naxed, buxom woman nailing wings on an distraught man—and the TV playing Godzilla and a milk bottle). I enjoyed his "Women and War 1" with a dog looking out the window onto the ocean, half of a naked girl on the floor, and a lit birthday cake in a suitcase.

Stefano Bertoldi from Dragonslair.it. One striking angel.

Michela Da Sacco from Dragonslair.it.

Sara Endel from Dragonslair.it.

Paola Traversa from Dragonslair.it

Elfwood: Bethany Davies.

Elfwood: Eric Decluseau has an amusing cartoon of an angel restrained by a ball and chain, and some good dragons.

Elfwood: Christoph Jaszczuk. Hobby artist in his "first appearance" has some interesting stuff. I liked his Jungle Queen.

Amy Brown Fantasy Art. Faeries are the main event here, but there are a few angels, dragons and mermaids.

Dale D Ziemianski. Well-executed, sometimes funny but often cheesy fantasy art.

Anne El-Habre. I am very fond of her statement on ASFA.

"I try to go back to the beginning, to the origins of most of the folklore and the stories that were told. I find that over the years and centuries the stories get watered down and homogenized to the point where they have lost the sense of what made them so provocative in the first place. Faeries are not cuddly, mermaids are not friendly, and angels, from any culture, are formidable."

The Enchanted Art Collection of Jessica Galbreth-Painter"painter of myth, magic and enchantment." She has an attractive series of "angelic virtues."

Tania Henderson. See her Angels Gallery. I am a fan of "Blue Mermaid" and "Lauren" from her Mermaid Gallery.

Uwe Jarling / Jarling Arts. Numinous.

Charlene Maguire / Shapeshifter Studios. Appealing fantasy and non-fantasy art.

Postmortem: The Art of R K Post. Striking angels, fallen and not.

Myth, Magic & Mystery: The Art of Teri Rosario. Angel children.

The Enchanted Art of Abranda Icle Sisson. Angels, fairies and mythology.

Dragginart Studios' artist Dusten Sonnon.

Christophe Vacher. Former animation artist with some appealing angels.

The Artwork of Anthony Waters. Science fiction and fantasy.

Maria J. William: Mare Infinitus. Accomplished mermaids, faeries, angels and others from a New York artist

Boris Vallejo and Julie Bell. Vallejo, at least, needs no introduction. They seem to have merged web opperations entirely.

Fabiana Kofman. Beautiful angels in acrylics, watercolors and digital media.

Carl Lundgren Art Studios.

MaverickArts, The Official Website of Monte M. Moore. Lush pinups and extravagant sculptures.

Jennifer O'Meara's Dragon Dreams. Meara has some striking stuff—dragons, angels, mermaids, even a griffin. Unfortunately, the posted sizes are often small.

Light and Magic: Magical Visions of Jurgen Ziewe. Luminous angels.

Dan Harding. Harding did a number of the monsters for the "Colossal Arena" card game. Wonderful game, evocative illustrations.

Dorian Cleavenger. This is some extreme stuff. Linking to the average pinup angel doesn't bother my conscience. I can understand a parent who would want their kids shielded from such images, but the onus is on them to provide the right moral context, supervision and software. And although I can understand arguments from blasphemy, they don't tweak my conscience. Cleavenger's work, by contrast, bothers me. Basically, Cleavenger paints realistic, highly-sexualized images of angels, mermaids, fairies, vampires, snakes, nun-demons, octopus-demons, and even bug-aliens, with an in-mixture of violence, perverse religion, medical implements, leather, and fluids. After looking through his images, I want to wash my hands. Nevertheless, Cleavenger's work belongs in a survey of angel art. Perhaps, in a sense, he's where Bouguereau was always leading.

Mary Baxter St. Claire / Enchanted Island Studios. Sentimental angels and mermaids.

Adam Rote. Grace Jones, Goldie Hawn and Kurt Russel are apparently fans.

Noah Fine Art with a striking angel gallery.

Fantasy Art by Selene Fenech, including her 1999 book Fallen and much else.

The Griffin's Lair / Jessica Entis.

B.L. Render / Bloodsong produces interesting 3D computer art, with dramatic camera angles and situations.

Ever and Co., an unknown French artist with a distinctive high-fashion photoshop/photograph style. She has a gallery of angels. On Deviantart she calls herself "Everestelle."

Dark Natasha has a number of angels, and a large selection of dragons.

Tiger Lily Treasures / Beth Norton. Norton does some very colorful and striking stained glass mosaics, her fine art gallery includes angels and mermaids.

John T. Unger fashions a wide variet of interesting mosaics.

Joy Day, artist and costume designer.

The Fantasy Art of John Chandler. Mostly black and white drawings, of dragons.

Lilleah Adora West (Elfwood) with some oddities, including a wolf angel and the "Keeper of the East".

Nicole Gramlich (Elfwood). One hippogriff, more unicorns.

Xenia Eliassen / Swandog Studio does a wide variety of different styles, from the ever-present "furries" to considerably more interesting work with Celtic and Byzantine roots.

Giorgio Beltramini from the rich Italian site Dragonslair.it.

Elfwood: Elizabeth Faulkner.

Judith Metzger. One portrait of Michael.

Danielle Downer.

Margaret A. Hammond (Elfwood).

Iconography

Amazon. Subtle Bodies: Representing Angels in Byzantium by Glenn Peers. (publisher's blurb).

Review by Jas' Elsner , Bryn Mawr Classical Review (June 2001).

"Despite the authorial disclaimer that he is an art historian, this is a book devoted largely to texts and to complex theological argument.

1911 Catholic Encyclopedia: Early Christian Representations of Angels, traces Christian depictions. Apparently, before Constantine, angels were wingless and "never represented unless historically necessary, as in the Annunciation scene referred to — and not always even then."

Extrait du "Traité d'Iconographie chrétienne" by Xavier Barbier de Montault (1890), from Les Anges Guardiens.

Community of Angels Project

A Community of Angels. Los Angeles project where artists painted pre-made angels, which were then set up around the city on the model of Chicago's cow sculptures, etc. These photos were taken by Ruth Wallach, and are part of. Public Art in L.A. "A Community of Angels" had its own site at one point. The web archive version is here. My favorite, incidentally, is Seeroon Yeretzian's angels-on-angel. Oddly, enough, she was the only person to go that way.

Amazon. A Community of Angels: Los Angeles by Michele Dugan, Hannah Kaufman, Marnie Tenden (publisher's blurb)

Mark Spatny's photos of some of the angels.

Raphael's ubiquitous cherbus

You know the ones—those bored, winged infants. They're so ubiquitous that I created a special Raphael's Cherubs to contain all the version, parodies and merchandise associated with it.

This page has an astouding 75 different versions of Raphael's bored Cherubs! Border, no border, yellow border, gold border, black border, cropped, cropped close, cropped very close, cropped with wings poking out, left alone, right alone with left alone with both right and left alone (why??), horizontally flipped…

Melinda Cooper has a number of very amusing kitten-substitutions, including Thayer and, of course, Raphael's bored cherubs. Other paintings include a take-off on Degas' ballerinas (with gerbils), and a kitty Odalisque.

Arthur Erberber, Raphael's Angelsdepicts the babies being painted, with diapers subtracted and wings added.

Editorial: My problem with this painting is this: (1) the point is, I suppose, to puncture the illusion—to see what was "behind" Raphael's depiction. First, you can't puncture something that's already punctured; Raphael's angels aren't mythic, they're bored—only cropping and sentimentality transforms them into something other than a joke. Second, you can't puncture them by making them realistic. Adding diapers is funny, but babies that age don't take up contemplative poses.

"This is one of my most personal paintings. In August of 1997, I ventured on a solo trip to Boston...long story short, things got screwed up with my motel arrangements, and I was left homeless for a night. I spent the night on this park bench to pass the night away. Since nothing bad happened to me on this eventful evening, the angels symbolize my growth as a traveler."

Marilyn Monroe throw into the scene. Painting by Ron Keas, who has a set of other odd/parody Monroes. And also the wonderful Basset-hound angels (inspired by the same Raphael).

Buy a puzzle from PuzzleZoo. "The angels are looking on, rather indifferently, and almost in boredom, at the scene of the virgin with the Child Jesus."