In 1824, when William Blake began his illustrations to Dante’s Divine Comedy, he was sixty-six and entering the last three years of his life. His health was declining and his finances remained precarious, but this was not a period of artistic withdrawal. He was completing the engravings to the Book of Job, and the youngerContinue reading “William Blake, Dante and Beatrice: Vision and Mediation”
Tag Archives: Romanticism
William Blake’s Hecate: Image, Symbol and Ambiguity
William Blake’s large colour print traditionally known as Hecate, or The Triple Hecate, was made around 1795 as part of a group of twelve large colour-printed designs. Three impressions survive, in the Tate, the Huntington and the National Galleries of Scotland. No title by Blake is known, and the designation Hecate appears to have enteredContinue reading “William Blake’s Hecate: Image, Symbol and Ambiguity”
Johan Christian Dahl (1788–1857): Two Landscapes through Windows
“The eye must be opened to the true and wondrous life of nature, and the hand must be trained to do the soul’s bidding quickly, easily, and beautifully. This alone can be the aim of instruction in any of the pictorial arts.” Carl Gustav Carus, Nine Letters on Landscape Painting, Letter VIII. Johan Christian Dahl’sContinue reading “Johan Christian Dahl (1788–1857): Two Landscapes through Windows”
