Opening of the Sixth Seal (1555): Artwork and History

Opening of the Sixth Seal (1555) is in the Art Institute of Chicago collection. The museum lists its creator attribution as Jean Duvet French, 1485-after 1561.

The work and its context

The Art Institute of Chicago describes the work:

In one of John’s first visions of the end of the world (Revelation 6:9–15), the opening of the sixth seal unleashes the Last Judgment. The sun and moon peeping out from under the altar suggests this breach marks an irrevocable astronomical as well as spiritual event. The pious dead—with their foreheads marked with a cross by God—rise into Heaven, while the gates of Hell open to receive those unworthy of salvation. Others, tormented into a crazed state by locusts, clamor for death and the fiery pit, which their satanic overlord is all too willing to grant.

Object facts

• Title: Opening of the Sixth Seal
• Date: 1555
• Artist attribution: Jean Duvet French, 1485-after 1561
• Place of origin: France
• Medium: Engraving in black on cream laid paper
• Dimensions: Image/sheet: 30.5 × 21.2 cm (12 1/16 × 8 3/8 in.)
• Type: Print
• Department: Prints and Drawings
• Reference number: 1956.1051

Collection credit

Bequest of Mrs. Potter Palmer, Jr.

View the original

Explore the artwork in the Art Institute's collection, including its image and the museum's current catalogue details.

The description above is credited to the Art Institute of Chicago and reused under Creative Commons Attribution 4.0; HTML formatting has been converted to plain text. Other catalogue metadata and the public-domain image are provided under CC0 1.0.