The Background

•  Its glitter and other remarkable qualities have always given gold a connotation of glory and abundance.

•  In ancient cultures, gold was associated with the sun and considered to be a carrier of the divine spirit.

•  The Aztecs saw gold as the image of their sun god, Huitzilopochtli.  They also recognized fragments of the sun as its rays, which touched the earth and were deposited in the ground in the form of gold veins.  Above, in the sky, those rays were pathways to heaven.

The Underlying Concept

The spider’s web is woven with the threads of human fate.  The painting reflects the tragedy of Man overcome by an all-consuming quest for wealth.   Blinded by the blazing sun, the victims fall off the web or find themselves at the mercy of the spider.