William Blake (1757-1827)
Visionary poet, painter and engraver.
Blake was born into a modest London family; his father was a hosier. His religious visions may have begun while still in childhood, and he started writing poetry and drawing as a youth. In 1772-9 he served an apprenticeship with the engraver James Basire (1730-1802), and subsequently studied at the Royal Academy drawing schools. In the following years he produced original watercolours and poems as well as pursuing a career as an engraver. He attracted the interest of a few supporters – notably the sculptor John Flaxman (1755-1826) and the amateur George Cumberland (1754-1848). He also met Fuseli for the first time, forming an important friendship.
In 1784-5 Blake tried to set himself up as a print publisher, but this venture failed. The death of his brother, Robert, in 1787 came as a great blow, intensifying his visionary and poetic tendencies. He created his own printmaking technique, ‘relief etching’, which allowed him to combine colour, texts and images in ‘illuminated books’. In 1795 Blake developed his technique further, with a group of twelve ‘large colour prints’. These combine literary, scriptural and imaginative references in a complex, and still-elusive, way.
Blake’s career as a commercial engraver suffered highs and lows, and his original work was supported only by a small number of collectors and artists. His most important patron was the civil servant Thomas Butts (1757-1845), who commissioned a long series of Biblical paintings and watercolours around 1800- 1805. After a disastrous one-man show in London in 1809, which consolidated his reputation for politically dangerous eccentricity – even madness – Blake became still more withdrawn. He remained active as an artist, however, now gaining the affection and support of a younger generation drawn to his spiritual qualities.
His work was not entirely forgotten after his death, but popular and scholarly interest in his work grew deeper only at the end of the nineteenth century. His reputation – as visionary, radical, Christian and individualist – has grown ever since.
