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Jun 13, 2012

Satan Starts from the Touch of Ithuriel's Spear

1776

Henry Fuseli

(Swiss, 1741–1825)

England, 18th century

Pen and brown ink and brush and gray wash

Support: Cream(2) laid paper, laid down on cream(2) modern? laid paper

Sheet: 30.9 x 42.5 cm (12 3/16 x 16 3/4 in.); Secondary Support: 31 x 42.7 cm (12 3/16 x 16 13/16 in.)

Dudley P. Allen Fund 1954.365

Catalogue raisonné: Schiff 483a

Location

not on view

Did you know?

This drawing is one of three almost identical drawings depicting the same scene from Paradise Lost; the other sheets are in the collections of the National Gallery, Stockholm, and the British Museum, London.

Description

Henry Fuseli's lifelong interest in the work of the English poet John Milton (1608-1674) inspired many drawings that interpreted passages from Milton's epic poem Paradise Lost (1667). This early example illustrates the moment when the angels Ithuriel and Zephon discover Satan disguised as a toad in the bower where Adam and Eve are sleeping. Ithuriel forces Satan to reveal himself by prodding him with a spear. The lion in the background alludes to an earlier passage in the poem, when Satan takes on the shape of the beast in order to spy on the couple.

Inscriptions

Inscription

inscribed, at lower center, in brown ink: Roma Oct. 76; at lower left, in brown ink: 17

Provenance

?-?

Dr. John Percy [1817-1889; Lugt 1504], London

?-?

Sir James Knowles, London

?-?

Eva Trüeb-Baumann, Chateau d'Hauterive, Switzerland

?-?

(Dr. G. A. Gericke, Zurich)

1954-

Cleveland Museum of Art, Cleveland, OH

Citations

Wartmann, Wilhelm. Johann Heinrich Füssli, 1741-1825: zur Zweihundertjahrfeier und Gedächtnisausstellung. Exh. Cat. Zürich: Kunsthaus Zürich, 1941. Mentioned and reproduced: p. 76, no. 240

"Accessions of American and Canadian Museums." Art Quarterly 17 (Winter 1954): 412. Mentioned: p. 412.

The World of Benjamin West. Exh. Cat. Allentown, PA: Allentown Art Museum, 1962. Mentioned: p. 76, no. 55

Wartmann, Wilhelm. Johann Heinrich Füssli, 1741-1825. Zurich: Kunsthaus. 1969. Mentioned and reproduced: p. 74

Schiff, Gert. Johann Heinrich Füssli 1741-1825: Text und Oeuvrekatalog. Zurich: Berichthaus, 1973. Mentioned: pp. 76, 110, 456, no. 483a

Pressly, Nancy. The Fuseli Circle in Rome: Early Romantic Art of the 1770s. Exh. Cat. New Haven, CT: Yale Center for British Art, 1979. Mentioned: p. 40, under no. 41

Bjurström, Per. Dürer to Delacroix: Great Master Drawings from Stockholm. Exh. Cat. Fort Worth, TX: Kimbell Art Museum, 1985. Mentioned: p. 84, no. 103

Important Old Master Pictures. New York: Christie's: 1995. Mentioned: pp. 296-7, under no. N146

Lemonedes, Heather. British Drawings: The Cleveland Museum of Art. Exh. Cat. Cleveland, OH: Cleveland Museum of Art, 2013. Mentioned and reproduced: pp. 30-31, 145, no. 5

Moster-Hoos, Jutta, ed. Die Geister, die sie riefen...: Lust- und Angstphantasien von Horst Janssen und Johan Heinrich Füssli. München: Hirmer, 2015. Reproduced: p. 47, fig. 9; Mentioned: p. 48

Exhibition history

Johann Heinrich Fussli, 1741-1825. Kunsthaus, Zurich (May 17 – July 6 1969).

Fuseli. Cleveland Museum of Art, Cleveland, OH (February 16 - March 7, 1954).

Johann Heinrich Füssli, 1741-1825: zur Zweihundertjahrfeier und Gedächtnisausstellung. Kunsthaus Zürich (August 17 - October 15, 1941).

The Drawings of Henry Fuseli. The Cleveland Museum of Art, Cleveland, OH (organizer) (February 16-March 10, 1954).

The World of Benjamin West. Allentown Art Museum, PA (organizer) (May 1-July 31, 1962).

Drawings. The Cleveland Museum of Art, Cleveland, OH (organizer) (January 11-September 10, 1963).

Rococo, Revolution, Restoration. The Cleveland Museum of Art, Cleveland, OH (organizer) (July 11-September 24, 1989).

Directions in Drawing II: The Human Figure. The Cleveland Museum of Art, Cleveland, OH (organizer) (November 5, 1991-January 12, 1992).

Master Drawings from the Cleveland Museum of Art. The Cleveland Museum of Art, Cleveland, OH (organizer) (August 27-October 17, 2000); The Morgan Library & Museum, New York, NY (May 23-August 19, 2001); Museum of Fine Arts, Houston, Houston, TX (October 14, 2001-January 6, 2002).

British Drawings from the Cleveland Museum of Art . The Cleveland Museum of Art, Cleveland, OH (organizer) (February 10-May 26, 2013).

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{{cite web|title=Satan Starts from the Touch of Ithuriel's Spear|url=https://clevelandart.org/art/1954.365|author=Henry Fuseli|year=1776|access-date=11 December 2023|publisher=Cleveland Museum of Art}}

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Satan Starts from the Touch of Ithuriel's Spear

Satan Starts from the Touch of Ithuriel's Spear

Henry Fuseli

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