The hawk of Artemis exemplifies death as it dives to pluck a random victim from a bank of frogs.

Detail of Artemis' hawk

Close up of hawk's head and shoulder feathers

Close-up detail of hawk's talons

Figures tipping and falling over one another. Once fallen they can never arise for they are perpetually weighed down by their grief.

Detail of back of falling male shade

Random hand reaches out in hopeless desperation

The ancient Greek author Aristophanes depicts a bank of frogs on the Acheron who would sing in chorus, chiding the condemned passers-by.

A potential victim to Artemis' hawk, this frog appears oblivious to the oncoming random threat, symbolic of the unpredictably of death's timing.

Detail of frog sitting on bank next to other frogs.

A dragonfly that sees everything with its 360° vision here represents an afterlife transparency where no sins hide from judgment.

Dominating female figure is held onto by another falling, forcing them both to collapse into the swampy bank

Woman falling holds on to the more upright woman

A detail of the hands clasp about the waist of upright woman

Close-up of face of fallen woman

A remorseful man and woman filled with sorry as they grasp their fate

Close-up of remorseful woman's face and hands

The frogs surround the new arrivals

Image is provide to illustrate size and scale

Underpainting of charcoal and acrylic wash created at the outset of painting