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Poetry in motion
While printing and type design was becoming more industrialized
in Britain, there is one artist who stood apart from the established
traditions. This is William Blake (1757-1827), who as I mentioned
earlier is often described as the first artists book maker. His
work was unique during this time for these reasons: it created a
painterly union with image and text,9 and he was self-published
with full control over the entire process. The union of image and
text and the idea of self publishing are both key elements that
are still important to many in the artists book field.
The content of Blake's
work is based on his strong belief in the spiritual world10 and
the belief that his writing and illustration could serve to transform
and educate others in their spiritual life. In his first work of
illuminated printing No Natural Religion,(1788),
Blake expresses his beliefs that "each individual has their own
vision of the world, sense of values, and structure of belief. Any
assertion of a unified view of the world, the cosmos, or spiritual
life misrepresented the originality and variety of human experience."11
This idea of independence and imagination is joined with themes
of innocence - a condition of enlightenment, and experience - in
the subsequent work of The Songs of Innocence."
Images, a fluid, graceful line, and in later works "forms and forces
of terrifying energy" accompany his rhythmic handwriting to create
a "visionary theater" within the confines of book.12
For ten
years Blake attempted to find a publisher that would allow him to
create his own images and engrave his own plates (two processes,
previously not done by the same person). Because publishers were
not willing to take his work under these terms and because of Blake's
poverty, he was forced to create an economical way to print and
to self-publish.
The process he developed
for creating his art came to him in a dream in which his deceased
and beloved brother describes the process.13 "His method was a form
of relief etching in which both words and images were formed in
some sort of fluid resist on a single copper plate. The lines were
probably brushed on the the plate with a small camel's hair brush,
one of Blake's favorite tools, so that the platemaking process was
essentially painterly, calligraphic, and much more direct than engraving.
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