William Blake (British, 1757–1827) was a visionary British artist, poet, and printmaker whose singular imagination defied the boundaries of his time. Active during the late 18th and early 19th centuries, Blake fused text and images to create illuminated books that tackled themes of innocence, experience, spiritual transcendence, and political oppression. Though largely unrecognized in his lifetime, his work now stands as a cornerstone of Romanticism and a forerunner to modern mystic and symbolist traditions.
Rejecting academic convention, Blake developed his own engraving techniques and mythological cosmology, often portraying radiant figures suspended between heaven and earth. His masterworks, including Songs of Innocence and of Experience and The Marriage of Heaven and Hell, reflect both fierce critique of industrial-era injustice and a profound faith in the redemptive power of the imagination. For Blake, art was not merely visual - it was a form of prophecy.
