Death of a Dragon

Painted towards the end of the First World War, Death of the Dragon depicts the culmination of war as a final apocalyptic confrontation between good and evil. A radiant angelic spirit descends from the heavens to defeat evil (appearing here in imagery derived from the Book of Revelations in the form of dragons), into a lake of fire. Some damned souls are also cast into the fiery pit while others move away from the precipitous edge of the abyss towards the fire. On the right of the painting, the woman in yellow draperies is painfully climbing up to the angel and the light. She keeps her eyes fixed on the light – her shackles are broken and her dragon is departing, with just a backward glance at his angelic spirit who has defeated it. Whilst the scene is still one of a devastated wasteland, the forces of good have clearly overcome that of evil.