{"meta":{"version":"2.1","_links":{"self":{"href":"https://api.vam.ac.uk/v2/object/O25247"},"collection_page":{"href":"https://collections.vam.ac.uk/item/O25247/"}},"images":{"_primary_thumbnail":"https://framemark.vam.ac.uk/collections/2025PG6511/full/!100,100/0/default.jpg","_iiif_image":"https://framemark.vam.ac.uk/collections/2025PG6511/","_alt_iiif_image":[],"imageResolution":"high","_images_meta":[{"assetRef":"2025PG6511","copyright":"© Victoria and Albert Museum, London","sensitiveImage":false},{"assetRef":"2006AU5677","copyright":"© Victoria and Albert Museum, London","sensitiveImage":false},{"assetRef":"2019MC9613","copyright":"© Victoria and Albert Museum, London","sensitiveImage":false},{"assetRef":"2017KB4669","copyright":"©Victoria and Albert Museum, London","sensitiveImage":false},{"assetRef":"2023NR0150","copyright":"© Victoria and Albert Museum, London","sensitiveImage":false}]},"see_also":{"_iiif_pres":"https://iiif.vam.ac.uk/collections/O25247/manifest.json","_alt_iiif_pres":[]}},"record":{"systemNumber":"O25247","accessionNumber":"FA.697","objectType":"Watercolour","titles":[{"title":"Satan arousing the rebel angels","type":"popular title"}],"summaryDescription":"Thomas Butts (1757-1845) commissioned the artist William Blake (1757-1845) to produce a series of watercolours. They were to illustrate John Milton’s epic poem ‘Paradise Lost’, which was first published in 1667. Butts, a civil servant, was one of Blake’s most loyal patrons.\r\n\r\nInspired by Milton’s text, Blake represents Satan and his angel accomplices as beautiful in appearance. He based the nude figures on classical sculpture and on drawings and paintings by Michelangelo (1475-1564).","physicalDescription":"Satan stands, full frontal, with arms raised, weight on his left leg. He is surrounded by seven rebel angels, who crouch, lie and sit, writhing, on the rocks below. The angels have metal bands around their wrists. Painted in tones of grey and brown.","artistMakerPerson":[{"name":{"text":"Blake, William","id":"A3132"},"association":{"text":"artist","id":"AAT25103"},"note":""}],"artistMakerOrganisations":[],"artistMakerPeople":[],"materials":[{"text":"watercolour (paint)","id":"AAT15045"}],"techniques":[{"text":"watercolour painting (technique)","id":"THES250889"}],"materialsAndTechniques":"Watercolour","categories":[{"text":"Watercolours","id":"THES277714"},{"text":"Christianity","id":"THES48978"},{"text":"Religion","id":"THES48900"}],"styles":[{"text":"British School","id":"x30967"}],"collectionCode":{"text":"PDP","id":"THES48595"},"images":["2025PG6511","2006AU5677","2019MC9613","2017KB4669","2023NR0150"],"imageResolution":"high","galleryLocations":[{"current":{"text":"LVLC","id":"THES49171"},"free":"","case":"MB2A","shelf":"DR76","box":""}],"partTypes":[[{"text":"watercolour (painting)","id":"AAT78925"}]],"contentWarnings":[{"apprise":"No","note":""}],"placesOfOrigin":[{"place":{"text":"Great Britain","id":"x32019"},"association":{"text":"painted","id":"x30138"},"note":""}],"productionDates":[{"date":{"text":"1808","earliest":"1808-01-01","latest":"1808-12-31"},"association":{"text":"painted","id":"x30138"},"note":""}],"associatedObjects":[],"creditLine":"","dimensions":[{"dimension":"Height","value":"51.8","unit":"cm","qualifier":"","date":{"text":"","earliest":null,"latest":null},"part":"","note":""},{"dimension":"Width","value":"39.3","unit":"cm","qualifier":"","date":{"text":"","earliest":null,"latest":null},"part":"","note":""}],"dimensionsNote":"","marksAndInscriptions":[{"content":"'WBlake 1808'","inscriber":{"name":{"text":"","id":""},"association":{"text":"","id":""}},"date":{"text":"","earliest":null,"latest":null},"description":"","interpretation":"","language":"","medium":"","method":"","position":"lower left","script":"","translation":"","transliteration":"","type":"Signature; date","note":"Signature; date; lower left"}],"objectHistory":"This drawing may be the one listed by Rossetti as No.85a in his List I, but the set of 12 designs for 'Paradise Lost' to which it belonged are there dated 1807.\r\n\r\nProvenance: Bought from Colnaghi in 1869. \r\nNote on file: Bought in 1869 from Colnaghi. Rossetti {W.M. Rossetti] in 1880 ed. [edition] of Gilchrist [Alexander Gilchrist’s Life of William Blake ] speaks of a drg [drawing] of this subject (List I, 85a) as being in coll {collection] of Alfred Aspland. It is impossible to trace the provenance of FA.697 beyond 1869 as Colnaghni’s have no records further back than 1911 when they moved from Pall Mall to Bind Street. Rossetti describes the drawing listed by (I, 85a) as being dated 1807. Either Rossetti was mistaken, or there are two such drawings, one of 1807, and ours (1808).\r\n","historicalContext":"Satan Arousing the Rebel Angels is one of twelve illustrations to John Milton's Paradise Lost. The set was commissioned by Thomas Butts, Blake's major patron of the 1800s. In depicting scenes from Milton, Blake was following a well-worn tradition; among his contemporaries, Fuseli, James Barry and Thomas Stothard had all done so.\r\n\r\nThis particular subject was considered the most popular from Milton's epic, and Blake produced several versions. The Butts Satan, with its dominant full frontal figure, raised above the writhing forms of the fallen angels, all contained within a small picture area, has a precedent in Thomas Lawrence's work of the same subject exhibited at the Royal Academy in 1799. \r\n\r\nWhilst closely following the same compositional formula as his predecessors, Blake broke with tradition by evolving a highly personal and complex interpretation of Satan's rise and fall which was potentially in conflict with the spirit of Milton's poem. In the initial books of 'Paradise Lost' Satan is a figure of terror and power :'He called so loud, that all the hollow deep of Hell resounded'. This force is not suggested in Blake's water-colour. Blake's Satan has an Apollonian beauty as he tries to raise the seven enchained angels, hardly the legions 'thick as autumnal leaves' that Milton writes of.\r\n\r\nSatan's pose is also reminiscent of 'Glad Day', the first engraving Blake did in 1780. This raised nude figure with outstretched arms recurs repeatedly in Blake's work. In this instance, such familiarity with the pose tends to diminish the expressive potential necessary in depicting a truly Miltonic Satan.\r\n\r\n[Alex Noble, '100 Great Paintings in the V&A', p.90]","briefDescription":"Watercolour entitled 'Satan arousing the rebel angels' by William Blake. Great Britain, 1808.","bibliographicReferences":[{"reference":{"text":"","id":""},"details":"","free":"<i>100 Great Paintings in The Victoria & Albert Museum.</i>London: V&A, 1985, p.90"},{"reference":{"text":"Evans, Mark et al. <i>Vikutoria & Arubāto Bijutsukan-zō : eikoku romanshugi kaigaten = The Romantic tradition in British painting, 1800-1950 : masterpieces from the Victoria and Albert Museum</i>. Japan : Brain Trust, 2002","id":"AUTH332409"},"details":"","free":""},{"reference":{"text":"","id":""},"details":"","free":"Loukes, Andrew ed. <i>William Blake in Sussex: Visions of Albion</i> National Trust in association with Paul Hoberton Publishing, 2018."}],"production":"","productionType":{"text":"","id":""},"contentDescription":"","contentPlaces":[],"associatedPlaces":[],"contentPerson":[{"text":"Satan","id":"N1034"}],"associatedPerson":[],"contentOrganisations":[],"associatedOrganisations":[],"contentPeople":[],"associatedPeople":[],"contentEvents":[],"associatedEvents":[],"contentOthers":[{"text":"angels","id":"x30526"}],"contentConcepts":[],"contentLiteraryRefs":["Illustration to John Milton's 'Paradise Lost'\r\n'Nathless he so endured, till on the beach\r\nOf that inflamed sea he stood, and called\r\n\r\nHis legions, angel forms, who lay entranced\r\nThis as autumn leaves that strew the brooks\r\nIn Vallambrosa ...'"],"galleryLabels":[],"partNumbers":["FA.697"],"accessionNumberNum":"697","accessionNumberPrefix":"FA","accessionYear":null,"otherNumbers":[],"copyNumber":"","aspects":["WHOLE"],"assets":[],"recordModificationDate":"2026-03-17","recordCreationDate":"2000-02-16","availableToBook":false}}