Envy II (L'Envie II) from The Seven Deadly Sins (Les Sept péchés capitaux)

Envy II (L'Envie II) from The Seven Deadly Sins (Les Sept péchés capitaux) is a powerful etching and drypoint created by Marc Chagall in 1925 and formally published in 1926. This print is one of sixteen plates that form the complete portfolio, a major work of graphic art wherein Chagall interprets the timeless theological theme of the seven deadly sins through his characteristic lens of modernist symbolism and narrative abstraction.

The choice of etching, often supplemented by the finer, more immediate lines of drypoint, allowed Chagall to achieve a rich textural complexity distinct from his well-known painted canvases. The drypoint technique, which scratches directly into the plate, results in a burr that holds ink, producing a velvety, heavy line, perfectly suited to conveying the psychological weight and deep shadows associated with the sin of envy.

As an artist deeply integrated into French cultural life during the interwar period, Chagall fused the expressive freedom of European modernism with deeply personal, often biblical, imagery. In this work, the specific subject of Envy is rendered through distorted figures and unsettling perspectives, illustrating the corrosive nature of jealousy rather than merely depicting a narrative scene. Chagall’s French prints from the mid-1920s are recognized for their intense emotional clarity and technical precision.

This portfolio represents a key period in Chagall’s career where he devoted significant attention to illustration and graphic media. The complete set of prints, including this specific iteration of Envy II, stands as a primary example of 20th-century allegorical art. Classified as a print of major importance, the work resides in the permanent collection of the Museum of Modern Art, underscoring its historical and artistic value within the canon of Modernist graphic works created during 1925, published 1926.