Louis Moe

Louis Moe (1857-1945) was a Norwegian-Danish painter , drawing , illustrator and writer . He was one of Scandinavia's most important book illustrator in the period before and around World War I , with a large manufacturing including picture and storybooks through a period of fifty years. Louis Moe held a very high professional level both character wise and narrative and was recognized throughout the Nordic region within the book , drawing and illustration art, as well as etching and lithography. He was also well known in the United States. His picture stories without text can be seen as precursors of the comics , and he has by some been called Denmark's Walt Disney.

Yael and Sisera

Alessandro Turchi (1600-1610)

Yael or Jael is a character mentioned in the Book of Judges in the Hebrew Bible, as the heroine who killed Sisera to deliver Israel from the troops of king Jabin. She was the wife of Heber the Kenite.

Ottavio Vannini (1640s)

 God told Deborah (a prophetess and leader) that she would deliver Israel from Jabin. Deborah called Barak to make up an army to lead into battle against Jabin on the plain of Esdraelon. But Barak demanded that Deborah would accompany him into the battle. Deborah agreed but prophesied that the honour of the killing of the other army's captain would be given to a woman. Jabin's army was led by Sisera (Judg. 4:2), who fled the battle after all was lost.

Gregorio Lazzarin (second half of 17th c.)

Yael received the fleeing Sisera at the settlement of Heber on the plain of Zaanaim. Yael welcomed him into her tent with apparent hospitality. She 'gave him milk' 'in a lordly dish'. Having drunk the refreshing beverage, he lay down and soon sank into the sleep of the weary. While he lay asleep Yael crept stealthily up to him, holding a tent peg and a mallet. She drove it through his temples with such force that the peg pinned his head to the ground. As a result of the killing of Sisera, God gave the victory to Israel. Yael is considered "blessed", according to the text, because of her action.

Artemisia Gentileschi (1620)

There are many similarities with the Judith-Holofernes biblic story posted some years ago.
-A woman brings the end of a war killing the enemy leader by cheating him for fake familiarity
-The fatal strike is a gruesome action on the head of the victim.
-Also Artemisia Gentileschi found both of them interesting themes for expressing through her magnificent art her rage for her molesting and maltreatment by men in a male society of inferiority of women.

Palma il Giovane 1548–1628

Jacopo Amigoni (1739)

Jacopo Vignali (17th cent)

Richard Tennant Cooper

“An unconscious naked man lying on a table being attacked by little demons armed with surgical instruments; symbolising the effect of chloroform on the human body.”, 1912

Richard Tennant Cooper was a medical painter late 19th early 2oth cenury. His paintings combine medicine with fantasy. Skeletons or evil ghosts represent fatal diseases that attack humans and sometimes medicine and science in human form intervene for their salvation.

“Syphilis”, 1912

“A giant claw pierces the breast of a sleeping naked woman, another naked woman swoops down and stabs the claw with a knife ; symbolising science’s fight against cancer.”, c. 1910

Diphtheria Trying to Strangle a Small Child (ca. 1910)

The angel of death (a winged skeletal creature) drops some deadly substances into a river near a town; symbolising typhoid, 1912

A sickly female invalid sits covered up on a balcony overlooking a beautiful view, death (a ghostly skeleton clenching a scythe and an hourglass) is standing next to her, 1912

Walpurgis Night (Walpurgisnacht)

Luis Ricardo Falero (1878)

Walpurgis Night (Walpurgisnacht) is a traditional spring festival on 30 April or 1 May in large parts of Central and Northern Europe. It is often celebrated with dancing and with bonfires. It is exactly six months from All Hallows' Eve. In Germany, Walpurgisnacht, the night from 30 April to 1 May, is the night when witches are reputed to hold a large celebration on the Brocken and await the arrival of spring. Walpurgis Night (in German folklore) the night of 30 April (May Day's eve), when witches meet on the Brocken mountain and hold revels and orgies with the Devil. Around the summit of the Brocken, the witches dance for the Devil, who then selects one of the witches to be his Bride for the year. Brocken is the highest of the Harz Mountains of north central Germany. It is noted for the phenomenon of the Brocken spectre and for witches' revels which reputedly took place there on Walpurgis night.

Dave Lipscomb for Belialian Woman By Hydra M. Star

Franz Xaver Simm (1853-1918) for Faust

Johannes Praetorius Blockes-Berges Verrichtung, Leipzig u.a. 1668

Faust performance poster, 1887

A scene in Goethe's Faust Part One is called "Walpurgisnacht," and one in Faust Part Two is called "Classical Walpurgisnacht." The last chapter of book five in Thomas Mann's The Magic Mountain is also called "Walpurgisnacht." In Edward Albee's 1962 play Who's Afraid of Virginia Woolf?, Act Two is entitled "Walpurgisnacht." From Bram Stoker's short story, "Dracula's Guest," an Englishman is on a visit to Munich before leaving for Transylvania. It is Walpurgis Night, and in spite of the hotelier's warning not to be late coming back, the young man later leaves his carriage and wanders toward the direction of an abandoned "unholy" village. As the carriage departs with the frightened and superstitious driver, a tall and thin stranger scares the horses at the crest of a hill.

W. Jury after Johann Heinrich Ramberg Walpurgisnacht scene in Faust (1829) 

Walpurgisnacht, Gemälde von Albert Welti (1897)

Witches flying to Sabbat by Bernard Zuber Woodblock print 1926

Johfra: Witches Sabbath (1977)

Émile-Antoine Bayard (1870)

Francisco Goya (1797-1798)

Jacob Corneliszoon van Oostsanen (1526)

Stefan Eggeler's etchings for Gustav Meyrink's Walpurgisnacht (1922):

Santiago Caruso