Sketch Book for the Artist

GATHERINGS

The Human Condition

IN THE SPECTRUM of these vastly different gatherings

of people, we find a spiritual vision, a death charge of

brutality, and the gentle humor of sedate ridicule. We

also see qualities of line, mark, color, texture, and focus,

which by their choice and handling actually become the

force and spirit of each image. Blake has illuminated his

saddened Virgil on the shores of a dark world, where he

watches a turbulent spiral of punishment for the damned.

Misted in translucent layers of paint, pale souls of the lustful

are being spun into yet another realm of hell.

Kathe Kollwitz scratched and engraved her army of

clay-footed troglodytes who rage into war like a mudslide

of revenge. Heath Robinson lived through the same war-torn.

era as Kollwitz, and sweetened the often bleak years with his

impractical inventions. Opposite, a pink-inked cinema wobbles

along with string, inextinguishable in its fortitude and humor.

WILLIAM BLAKE

British visionary, poet, writer artist, and engraver

who powerfully illustrated his own texts in addition

to Dante's Divine Comedy, the Bible, and other

works. Blake was driven by a passion for justice

and a profound belief in his visitations from angels.

Brushed line and wash This is an ink-outlined drawing

made with a fine brush on paper with added washes of

watercolor The image was subsequently redrawn as a

line engraving. It illustrates a scene from Dante's Divine

Comedy. The muscularity of Blake's figures was inspired

by Michelangelo's works.

The Circle of the Lustful

(The Whirlwind of Lovers)

1824

143 / 4 x 207 / 8 in (374 x 530 mm)

WILLIAM BLAKE