The Great Red Dragon Paintings are a series of watercolour paintings by the English poet
and painter William Blake, painted between 1805 and 1810. It was during this period that
Blake was commissioned to create over a hundred paintings intended to illustrate books of
the Bible. These paintings depict 'The Great Red Dragon' in various scenes from the Book
of Revelation.
The Paintings The Great Red Dragon and the Woman Clothed
in Sun In this painting, the Dragon is seen ready
to punch the child of the pregnant woman as depicted in Revelation 12. Height: 43.7 cm,
Width: 34.8 cm Housed at the Brooklyn Museum.
The Great Red Dragon and the Woman Clothed with the Sun
This image is similar to The Great Red Dragon and the Woman clothed in Sun but shown from
a different viewpoint. Height: 40.8, Width: 33.7 cm
Housed at the National Gallery of Art, Washington D.C..
The Great Red Dragon and the Beast from the Sea
Height: 40.1 cm, Width: 35.6 cm Housed at the National Gallery of Art, Washington
D.C.. The Number of the Beast is 666
Height: 40.6 cm, Width: 33.0 cm Housed at: the Rosenbach Museum & Library
Popular culture The character of the Great Red Dragon plays
a prominent role in Thomas Harris' novel Red Dragon and its film adaptations, Manhunter
and Red Dragon, in which the primary antagonist Francis Dolarhyde has an obsession with the
painting. Dolarhyde is fixated with the strength and power he thinks the dragon exudes, so
he takes up bodybuilding and, by the events of the novel, he is described as being able
to clean and jerk, 300 lbs, meaning he is physically very powerful, and in his mind,
like the dragon. He also has a giant tattoo of the dragon etched onto his back. Thomas
Harris makes an error in citing The Great Red Dragon and the Woman Clothed with the
Sun as the object of Dolarhyde's fixation while describing The Great Red Dragon and
the Woman Clothed in Sun, specifically the Dragon's tail wrapping around the woman, a
detail specifically accurate of the "in" painting. As well, Harris refers to the "with" painting
as having been loaned by the Brooklyn Museum for a Blake retrospective at the Tate—the
"in" painting is the version held by the Brooklyn Museum. Note, however, that the Brooklyn Museum's
own website shows the "in" painting, but labels it "with", so perhaps the error is the Museum's
and not Harris'. Manhunter shows the "with" painting as named in Harris' book, and has
the front-facing Dragon from that painting tattooed on Dolarhyde's chest, whereas Red
Dragon uses "in" as described by Harris along with the back and leg tattoos.
A mural-sized reproduction of The Great Red Dragon and the Woman Clothed in Sun appears
painted on a wall in "Sight Unseen," an episode of The Flash. The television series' art direction
is noted for regularly featuring elaborate, theme-specific murals.
All of the paintings in the series were used for the artwork of the Legend CD trilogy by
the band Saviour Machine. The Mentalist, in which the works of William
Blake are a recurring theme, has an episode named after this painting. As the episode
has yet to air, it is not yet clear in which way the title will play in, but it is likely
an allusion to the serial killer "Red John", first in-series reciter of one of Blake's
poems. Sleepy Hollow; in season 1, episode 4, "The
Lesser Key of Solomon"; when Ichabod Crane is showing Lt. Grace Abigail "Abbie" Mills
the picture of the creature that she saw in the woods it is an image of The Great Red
Dragon and the Woman Clothed in Sun. In the scene, the painting is mislabeled "The Flight
of Moloch", which is the name of yet another Blake work.
References