William Blake - Isaac Newton

Title: Isaac Newton
Artist: William Blake (1757-1827)
Date: 1795-1805
Medium: Color print with pen, ink and watercolor on paper
Dimensions: 46 x 60 cm

In “Isaac Newton”, the famous scientist is shown sitting naked on a rocky outcropping apparently at the bottom of the dark sea. He is holding a compass and crouching over a diagram. His attention seems totally absorbed by the diagram and he seems oblivious to his surrounding, including to the presence of the viewer. In Blake’s mythology, Isaac Newton is trapped in the state of Ulro, that of measurement and data which is useful but limited. Instead, Blake believed in spiritual vision, imagination, subjectivity, etc.