The National Gallery of Art in Washington DC presents Going through Hell: The Divine Dante, a look at how the poet’s masterwork has influenced artists down the ages. Drawing from the Gallery’s own collection, this intimate exhibition opens with a large allegorical portrait of the artist sitting at the edge of a landscape, gazing back at souls ascending the mountain of Purgatory. In his lap, he holds an open book inscribed with the canto describing his desire to escape his own Purgatory of exile by returning to to his beloved Florence.
Nearby is a bronze of Auguste Rodin’s famous The Thinker who represents Dante. This smaller, original version was made for a set of doors depicting the Gates of Hell commissioned for a Paris museum. His equally iconic The Kiss, part of that same commission, stands in the next room.
