28 Paintings That Inspired Album Covers

Coldplay used Delacroix. Guns N' Roses borrowed Raphael. Here are 28 album covers that stole from the masters.

Musicians have been appropriating classical paintings for album covers since the 1960s. Here’s a selection of notable covers that lifted directly from art history.

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1 | Delacroix & Coldplay

Coldplay’s 2008 album “Viva la Vida or Death and All His Friends” uses Eugène Delacroix’s “Liberty Leading the People” (1830) with the album title painted in white over the image. Delacroix painted this work after witnessing the July Revolution in Paris, which overthrew King Charles X. The painting hangs in the Louvre and depicts the personification of Liberty leading citizens over barricades.

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2 | Titian & Crash Test Dummies

The 1993 album “God Shuffled His Feet” features Titian’s “Bacchus and Ariadne” (1520–1523), a Renaissance mythological scene showing the god Bacchus leaping from his chariot. The original painting is in London’s National Gallery.

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3 | Fantin-Latour & New Order

Peter Saville designed the 1983 cover for “Power, Corruption & Lies” using Henri Fantin-Latour’s “A Basket of Roses” (1890). Saville found the painting on a postcard at London’s National Gallery when his girlfriend jokingly suggested he use it. MoMA added Saville’s cover design to its permanent collection in 2014.

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4 | Bosch & Deep Purple

Deep Purple’s third album (1969) borrows from the central panel of Hieronymus Bosch’s triptych “The Garden of Earthly Delights” (circa 1500). The painting, housed in Madrid’s Prado Museum, depicts fantastical creatures and naked figures in a surreal paradise.

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5 | Renoir & Rod Stewart

“A Night on the Town” (1976) features Pierre Auguste Renoir’s “Bal du moulin de la Galette” (1876). Renoir’s Impressionist painting captures an outdoor dance at a Montmartre café and is held by the Musée d’Orsay in Paris.

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6 | Gauguin & Michael Franks

The 1982 album “Objects of Desire” uses Paul Gauguin’s “Two Tahitian Women” (1899). Gauguin painted this during his final years in French Polynesia, and the work is in New York’s Metropolitan Museum of Art.

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7 | Basquiat & The Strokes

“The New Abnormal” (2020) features Jean-Michel Basquiat’s “Bird on Money” (1981). The neo-expressionist painting was created when Basquiat was 20 years old during his collaboration with street art.

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8 | Millais & Taylor Swift

Swift’s folklore era imagery drew from John Everett Millais’s “Ophelia” (1851–1852). The Pre-Raphaelite painting shows Shakespeare’s Ophelia floating in a stream and hangs in Tate Britain, London.

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9 | Bruegel & Fleet Foxes

Fleet Foxes’ 2009 EP uses detail from Pieter Bruegel the Elder’s “Netherlandish Proverbs” (1559). The painting in Berlin’s Gemäldegalerie illustrates over 100 Dutch proverbs through literal depictions.

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10 | Raphael, Greuze & The Smashing Pumpkins

John Craig created the “Mellon Collie and the Infinite Sadness” (1995) cover by combining two paintings: Raphael’s “Saint Catherine of Alexandria” (circa 1507) for the body and Jean-Baptiste Greuze’s “The Souvenir” (1787) for the face. The artwork received a Grammy nomination for Best Recording Package in 1997.

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11 | Bosch & Pearls Before Swine

The 1967 debut “One Nation Underground” uses sections from Bosch’s “The Garden of Earthly Delights.” Psychedelic folk bands frequently appropriated medieval religious imagery during this period.

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12 | Manet & Bow Wow Wow

The 1981 album with the extended title features a recreation of Édouard Manet’s “Le Déjeuner sur l’herbe” (1863). Manager Malcolm McLaren conceived the provocative shoot with 14-year-old singer Annabella, which sparked controversy.

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