| dc.description | William Blake was an 'English poet and printmaker who became one of leading figures of what would later be called Romanticism. His most original work is to be found in his hand-printed books of prophecy and personal mythology, done by a process he called "illuminated printing." Blake was largely forgotten until Rossetti and other Pre-Raphaelites hailed his work as visionary, and by the 20th century his ideas were seen as blueprints for the counterculture ideas of the 1960s. His wife Catherine assisted him in hand-coloring his illuminated prints.' (www.getty.edu) Blake created several renditions of 'Job reproved by his friends' in his life and comparisons can be made between Blake's and James Barry's etching (1777, see image cgjc0771) of the same scene. 'Barry, who was admired and emulated by Blake, plans the scene as if it were a neo-classical history painting, with powerful figures frozen in a moment of dramatic action in the foreground. Blake moved the focus in closer, presenting figures that swell to fill almost the entire picture space. Here the comforters are virtually a composite being, Blake's triple accuser, and Job himself has become an Everyman-figure.' (Morton Paley, 'William Blake: His Art and Times,' The Burlington Magazine, 124, no 957 (Dec 1982): 789.) | en |
