William Blake
1757-1827
William Blake - an English painter, engraver and poet, was born November 28, 1757, in London, where he lived most of his life. From the age of seven he habitually saw a white-bearded God peering in through his window, or angels perching in trees.
An admirer of Dürer, Michelangelo and Raphael and a friend of Fuseli, Blake was extremely eccentric. He walked the streets in a Phrygian bonnet. His work, still obscure, suggests a new version of Christianity, whose radicalism lies in its visual Symbolism. He died in London, August 12, 1827, leaving uncompleted a cycle of drawings inspired by Dante's Divine Comedy.
