The Silver Devil
1865
François-Nicolas Chifflart’s 1865 drawing is a chaotic masterpiece of greed and desperation. At the center, a horned, tailed devil sits comfortably on a rock, casually pouring a bowl of silver coins down to the masses. Below him, a tangle of desperate figures scrambles, fights, and reaches upward, their bodies twisted in agony and lust for wealth. It’s a perfect example of Romanticism’s love for the dramatic and the dark, turning the abstract concept of avarice into a literal devilish free-for-all.
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