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When one looks in the box, whatever remains, however improbable, must be the cat.

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Dragons are arguably the most ubiquitous and most beloved fantastical creature. Initially I shied away from dragons as a theme—they’re everywhere, where do you even start!? But they are everywhere because they are cool, and seeking out dragon images meant going down a delightful rabbit-hole through all ages, cultures, styles, and dispositions. So without further ado, welcome to Picturing Dragons, at 170 drawings and paintings, it is perhaps the largest installment of the Picturing series yet!

We start off (above) with one of the most beautiful renditions of one of the most famous dragons of them all, Alan Lee’s Smaug.

The first of many Saint George and the Dragon paintings we’ll see here—and perhaps one of the most famous—by Raphael.

Picturing Dragons

And from Raphael to the Pre-Raphaelites, Edward Burne-Jones with Perseus and Andromeda in The Doom Fulfilled.

Picturing Dragons

Robert Hunt created this worm-like underground dragon for a Tor.com story by Garth Nix, “Fire Above, Fire Below.”

Robert Hunt artwork for Garth Nix's Fire Above, Fire Below

Julie Dillon’s beautifully conceived desert dragon.

Picturing Dragons

Aaron Miller, Dragons of Red Rocks Canyon. I love that the dragon has a decorated entrance.

Aron Miller, Red Rocks Dragon

From Ciruelo Cabral, an Argentine painter who specializes in dragons.

Picturing Dragons

Elves and dragons, two elegant creatures—by John Howe.

Picturing Dragons

Jaime Jones. I love how completely natural this scene is.

Picturing Dragons

Jon Foster created a great series of covers for Tim Zahn featuring a boy with a dragon tattoo…which is not always just a tattoo.

Picturing Dragons

Another from Aaron Miller, The Scouting Party.

Arron Miller

Still one of my favorite Donato Giancola paintings. The glade is beautiful and the dragons look so natural in it. For Barbara Hambly’s Dragonshadow.

Picturing Dragons

Darrell Sweet paints a scene from The Silmarillion.

Darrell K. Sweet

Of course, no post about dragon art can skip Michael Whelan and Anne McCaffrey’s Pern. Here are just two examples drawn from their collaboration over the years. Sadly, McCaffrey is longer with us, but you can read Whelan’s touching tribute to her here.

Picturing Dragons

Picturing Dragons

John Howe, working magic with warm and cool glows.

Picturing Dragons

Daenerys Targaryen and her dragons, by Michael Komark.

Picturing Dragons

And another from Jon Foster’s set of Timothy Zhan covers about a boy and his tattoo dragon…

Picturing Dragons

Emperor Huang Di from Austin Hsu.

Picturing Dragons

Cory Godbey’s sea dragon looks so casual and human in this painting.

Picturing Dragons

Stephen Hickman for Steven Brust Jhereg. Here’s one where the dragon’s near-human hands seem to add some intelligence to the creature.

Picturing Dragons

Epic in every way: Nicolas Delort, a contemporary scratchboard artist working in fantasy and science fiction. (Here’s a guy that knows how to carve a niche out for himself!) Here’s Eowyn and the Nazgul.

Picturing Dragons

Arthur Rackham being amazing.

Picturing Dragons

Justin Gerard is a young artist with a great knack for classic storytelling. Here’s his take on Saint George and the Dragon. This is just one of a series—you should check out the rest.

Picturing Dragons

Viktor Vasnetsov’s seven-headed Hydra.

Picturing Dragons

Brian Froud’s homage to John Bauer. (The original Bauer image is posted further down below.)

Picturing Dragons

Briton Rivière shows us a different angle on Saint George and the Dragon.

Picturing Dragons

Siegfried tastes the dragon’s blood, from Arthur Rackham.

Picturing Dragons

A girl and her dragon, what can be more harmless? By Zach Montoya.

Picturing Dragons

Sam Weber for Jane Lindskold’s The Thirteen Orphans, a fantasy novel based on the Chinese zodiac.

Picturing Dragons

Detail from the Islamic Book of Kings, art attributed to Qasim ibn ’Ali.

Picturing Dragons

Iconic profile by concept artist Iain McCaig.

Picturing Dragons

Ukiyo-e artist Ogata Gekko’s dragon rising…

Picturing Dragons

Jaime Jones. This is one of those paintings that instantly places you there. Each time I see it, all I can think of is, “We are so screwed.”…and then I remember to admire the light, the composition….

Picturing Dragons

A scene from Xiaodi so real it feels like it’s happening right now.

Picturing Dragons

Don Maitz and the Death of the Last Dragon.

Picturing Dragons

Donn P. Crane’s Siegfried slaying Fafnir.

Picturing Dragons

I was so happy to stumble into this J. C. Leyendecker piece. It wouldn’t be a Picturing post without him, and it’s just a great image.

J. C. Leyendecker

Frank C. Papé, an English artist, taking on the Russian folk tale “Falcon the Hunter.”

Picturing Dragons

A really lovely Saint Michael and the Dragon from an unknown artist, believed to be from Spain.

Picturing Dragons

An early morning chase from Heather Theurer.

Heather Theurer

Julie Bell, mixing realistic rendering of the figure with a wonderfully loose and textural dragon.

Picturing Dragons

These two look like they were born for each other. By Jason Chan.

Picturing Dragons

Michael Komarck with not just an awesome dragon, but the courage to show the scene through a veil of spears.

Picturing Dragons

Bob Eggleton has painted approximately one gazillion dragons. Consider this just a prod to go look up the rest.

Picturing Dragons

Kinuko Craft, always stunning, always elegant. This one for Freda Warrington’s Grail of the Summer Stars.

Picturing Dragons

Omar Rayyan, one of the great animal caricaturists of all time. Seriously. We’re just lucky to have him in our time.

Picturing Dragons

Android/Andrew Jones: monarch dragon, made of thousands of butterflies.

Picturing Dragons

Konstantin Vasilyev with a stylized mountain of a knight versus the snake-y dragon.

Picturing Dragons

The Child in the World by pre-Raphaelite Thomas Cooper Gotch.

Thomas Gotch

James Jean, tormented by a Secret.

James Jean

I couldn’t find an artist credit for this beyond “Art Deco Dragon,” but it’s a lovely piece so, whoever you were, thank you.

Picturing Dragons

James Jean’s take on Saint George and the Dragon for the hugely popular comic book series Fables.

Picturing Dragons

A classic from John Howe, one of the great Tolkien artists.

Picturing Dragons

Jon Hodgson’s painting is based largely on Tolkien’s Smaug drawing (seen at the end of this post.)

Picturing Dragons

Daren Bader, wings versus wings.

Picturing Dragons

A favorite find for me on this project. I didn’t know about Huangfan’s work before, but I’m sure glad I know about it now.

Picturing Dragons

A pile of dragon in Aftermath by Sandara.

Picturing Dragons

Jaime Jones with one really massive dragon.

Picturing Dragons

Lucas Graciano. I’m not sure whether it’s the dragon or the spear holders that are about to have a bad day.

Picturing Dragons

Just one image from Anna and Elena Balbusso’s lavishly-illustrated Beowulf.

Anna and Elena Balbusso

William Timlin, from The Ship That Sailed To Mars.

William Timlin's

Super-cute Saint George by JooHee Yoon.

Picturing Dragons

“Lead us not into temptation” from Mucha’s Pater Noster

Picturing Dragons

William Blake’s The Great Red Dragon

Picturing Dragons

This was one of my favorite finds while putting this collection together: Nine Dragons from Chen Rong. I’ve only shown one of the nine here but each one is a delight. Be sure to check out the whole scroll.

Picturing Dragons

Andrei Ryabushkin, In the Dragon Cave

Picturing Dragons

Jeremy Enecio, who often makes everything just on the other side of comfortable.

Picturing Dragons

Todd Lockwood breaking down fantastical anatomy in A Natural History of Dragons.

Todd Lockwood, Natural History of Dragons

Da Vinci’s dragon versus lion.

Picturing Dragons

Corinne Reid, The King’s Request.

Picturing Dragons

Wayne Anderson, from The Flight of Dragons.

Picturing Dragons

A scholarly dragon from David Thiérrée.

Picturing Dragons

Greg Ruth’s alternate illustration for the Tor.com story “Dragonkin.”

Picturing Dragons

Salvator Rosa painting, Jason Charming the Dragon.

Picturing Dragons

Frederic Leighton with Perseus and Andromeda.

Picturing Dragons

Chris Rahn’s Little Prince. This painting is just 5×7 inches small, created for the annual MicroVisions art auction.

Picturing Dragons

Lucas Graciano’s Dragon Swarm does a great job of showing one woman in control of a lot of power.

Picturing Dragons

Georg Janny. I have Charles Vess to thank for the introduction to Janny’s work.

Picturing Dragons

A truly ghoulish dragon from Min Yum.

Picturing Dragons

Andrew/Android Jones’ water dragon for 2012’s Year of the Dragon celebrations.

Andrew Jones

Another from Huangfan. I just love the sense of speed and flight that he gets from these bold and relatively simple shapes.

Picturing Dragons

Michael Pedro. A little glow in the mouth and the eye can be everything.

Picturing Dragons

Eyvind Earle, one of the great old Disney artists, concept art for Sleeping Beauty.

Picturing Dragons

One of the most famous dragon portraits of them all, John Jude Palencar’s Eragon. Author Christopher Paolini was so taken by Palencar’s work that he named an Inheritance Cycle king after him.

Picturing Dragons

Robert Hunt’s Dragon in Chains. You can see a comprehensive step-by-step for this piece on Hunt’s blog.

Picturing Dragons

Temeraire, by Karl Kopinski. A reader corrects me, not Temeraire but freind of Temeraire! Likely from The Black Powder War. (Thanks!)

475

It‘s remarkable how John Howe is able to put the subject of the painting in the middle distance. I also enjoy the fact that it’s such a lovely, blissful day.

John Howe

A Confabulation of Dragons from wonderful fairy-tale artist, Scott Gustafson.

Picturing Dragons

Now, these guys are adventuring…by Raoul Vitale.

Picturing Dragons

…and another from Raoul Vitale.

Picturing Dragons

Lars Grant-West showing off some quieter moments in a dragon’s life.

Lars Grant-West

Dragon taxi in Charles Lepec’s La Tarrasque.

Picturing Dragons

A beautiful emerald-eyed dragon from Stephan Martinière.

Picturing Dragons

Toothless is an in-house favorite, with good reason. Here’s a piece of concept art for How to Train Your Dragon.

Picturing Dragons

Tony DiTerlizzi’s Kenny & the Dragon.

Picturing Dragons

Italian naturalist Ulisse Aldrovandis Winged Dragon of Ethiopia.

Picturing Dragons

Dragon and dragons by Daren Bader.

Picturing Dragons

Charles Vess with the spirit of the forest.

Picturing Dragons

Bertha Lum, an American artist working in Japan.

Picturing Dragons

From Virginia Sterrett‘s Arabian Nights.

Picturing Dragons

Victo Ngai’s year of the dragon.

Picturing Dragons

Greg Manchess, painting Gene Wolfe’s The Wizard Knight in classic Golden Age style.

Picturing Dragons

Even Mike Mignola’s Hellboy has had to fight a dragon…

Picturing Dragons

One of three paintings Dan Dos Santos did featuring a punk-ish blacksmith/dragon slayer.

Dan Dos Santos

Sam Burley for the Tor.com short story, “Brother. Prince. Snake.”

Picturing Dragons

Now this would be a great moment, wouldn’t it? From Julie Dillon.

Picturing Dragons

Another from Sam Burley, and again for one of our short stories, Slayers.

Picturing Dragons

Nathan Fowkes for How To Train Your Dragon. This says so much with just a few fast blobs.

Picturing Dragons

A delightful middle-grade dragon from Greg Swearingen.

Picturing Dragons

Joshua Middleton, a young man meeting an even younger dragon.

Picturing Dragons

Dan Dos SantosThe Dragon Empress. This piece recently won a Spectrum medal.

Picturing Dragons

Mark Molchan has captured a great moment in which something big is about to happen…

/Mark Molchan

This Magic card from Cythnia Sheppard shows us just who is the most badass…and that fighting dragons is bloody business.

A Flight of Sky Knights from Kekai Kotaki.

Picturing Dragons

Michael Kaluta’s take on Eowyn and the Nazgul.

Picturing Dragons

Tim Paul (who created our own Rocket Talk logo) and a proudly fiery dragon.

Picturing Dragons

Charles Santoso, Dragon’s Nightmare.

Picturing Dragons

Craig Phillips, pleasantly hitching a ride.

Picturing Dragons

Concept art for How to Train Your Dragon by Shane Prigmore.

Picturing Dragons

Bayard Wu with great rhythm and one badass panda.

Bayard Wu

Where did Bill Carman’s dragon go?

Picturing Dragons

N. C. Wyeth…

Picturing Dragons

Scottish symbolist John Duncan, The Sword of Light.

John Duncan

A cover for Ursula Le Guin’s A Wizard of Earthsea by Leo and Diane Dillon.

Picturing Dragons

By someone named Mooncookie on Deviant Art.

Picturing Dragons

I had the pleasure of working with Kazuhiko Sano a few times. This one was for Elizabeth Kerner’s Song in the Silence.

Picturing Dragons

Fantasy art legend Keith Parkinson.: North Watch, for Dragon magazine.

Picturing Dragons

Giovanni Battista Crosato’s Jason and Medea charming the Sleepless Dragon of the Golden Fleece. For some reason I find this one funny.

Picturing Dragons

I’ve always loved Tolkien’s own drawings for Middle-earth.

Tolkien's Smaug

Virginia Frances Sterrett’s Cadmus Slays the Dragon

Picturing Dragons

N. C. Wyeth showing the original hipsters.

Picturing Dragons

Elenore Abbott’s illustration for The Two Brothers.

Picturing Dragons

Frank C. Papé on the Russian folk tale “Nikitich and Marina.”

Picturing Dragons

Utagawa Kunisada’s dragon riders.

Picturing Dragons

Pavel Orinyansky…everyone looks a little annoyed.

Picturing Dragons

Firat Solhan. Soooo sweet.

Picturing Dragons

Flying dragons and flying carpets. By Evaline Ness.

Picturing Dragons

Charles Vess and his typically masterful line work.

Picturing Dragons

British fairy tale artist John D. Batten.

Picturing Dragons

Russian fairy tale artist Nika Goltz.

Picturing Dragons

Ana Juan from Catherynne M. Valente’s Fairyland series. (It’s always great to see contemporary novels utilize illustration throughout.)

Picturing Dragons

Uh-oh! Peter de Seve.

Picturing Dragons

From Max Ernst’s surrealist picture book, A Week of Kindness.

Picturing Dragons

Henry Justice Ford from The Violet Fairy Book.

Henry Justice Ford

German illustrator Hermann Vogel takes on The Ring of the Nibelung.

Vogel Nibelung

British illustrator Sidney Sime, popular with Lord Dunsany

Picturing Dragons

Mark Summers’ scratchboard dragon, patiently waiting for his passage in.

Picturing Dragons

Eric Velhagen, showing another woman in complete command of a whole lot of dragon-power.

Picturing Dragons

Jeffrey Catherine Jones’ luxurious Dragon Slayer.

Picturing Dragons

A bookplate by Franz von Bayros: Saint George rescuing a maiden who looks like she’s doing just fine without him.

Picturing Dragons

Dragon tree, Ian Miller.

Dagon and Tree, Ian Miller

Arthur Rackham’s Leviathan.

Picturing Dragons

Resting in the dragon’s mouth—I couldn’t find the artist’s credit, anyone know who it’s by?

Pete Sinfield

An undead dragon with disturbingly human arms, by Steven Belldin.

Picturing Dragons

I love the movement and atmosphere in this—you can clearly hear and feel this scene. Lauren Saint-Onge.

Picturing Dragons

Many people have painted Eowyn and the Nazgul: this one by Donato Giancola is among the best.

Picturing Dragons

Stephan Martinière’s cover for Michael Swanwick’s The Dragons of Babel.

Picturing Dragons

One more from Eyvind Earle and Sleeping Beauty.

Picturing Dragons

One of the most adored folktale artists, Sweden’s John Bauer. In fact, this piece is the basis for the Brain Froud painting earlier in the post above!

Picturing Dragons

Sleeping Beauty’s Maleficent drawn by Stjepan Sejic.

Picturing Dragons

Edward Gorey proves that even dragons can be thoughtful and well mannered.

Picturing Dragons

Two from Olga Dugina and Andrej Dujin, A Thousand and One Nights

Picturing Dragons

…. and The Dragon’s Feather.

Picturing Dragons

Ignis, illustrated by P. J. Lynch, is about a sweet dragon that needs to learn how to breath fire.

Picturing Dragons

Yoshitaka Aman, looking very poisonous.

Picturing Dragons

This dragon wants them books…by Michael Komarck.

Picturing Dragons

Dan Milligan’s concept art for an ill-fated Pern movie (a shame—judging by the few samples I’ve seen, an “Art of” book would be wonderful.)

Picturing Dragons

Brom’s Serpent of One Thousand Kings.

Picturing Dragons

From Aleksi Briclot’s lavishly illustrated Merlin, a retelling of the classic Arthurian tale.

Picturing Dragons

I’ll sign off with Tolkien’s delightful Smaug. I know there are many, many more wonderful examples of dragons in art—please feel free to add pictures and links in the comments!

Picturing Dragons

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Irene Gallo

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