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Albion Rose (or The Dance of Albion)

Maker (British, 1757 - 1827)
Additional Title(s)
  • Glad day
  • The Dance of Albion
ClassificationsPRINTS
Dateca. 1793
Mediumetching/engraving color printed with gum or glue based pigments and hand finished with watercolors, pen and ink on wove paper
Dimensionsplatemark: 10 11/16 x 7 13/16 in. (27.2 x 19.9 cm.) sheet: 14 1/2 x 10 3/8 in. (36.8 x 26.3 cm.)
DescriptionFirst executed as a pencil drawing ca. 1780 (Victoria and Albert Museum, Butlin 1981, No. 73). There is no recorded impression of the first state printed in intaglio. Indeed, the first state is known only through the residual indications of intaglio lines in the Huntington impression. Another color printed impression is in the British Museum. In comparison to it, the Huntington impression is much more thinly printed, and thus it may be the second pull taken imediately after the British Museum print with little, if any, color added. Blake seems to have done most of his color printing from copperplates ca. 1794-96. In about 1804 or later, Blake reworked the plate, adding a worm just left of the figure's left foot, a bat-winged moth between his legs, and a caption: "Albion rose from where he labourd at the Mill with Slaves / Giving himself for the Nations he danc'd the dance of eternal death." Like the second state, the first may also be signed in the plate "WB inv 1780" (probably the date Blake "invented" the design on paper), but the color printing makes it impossible to see these letters present. The print was removed in 1953 from the copy of "The Song of Los" in the Library. While part of that book, the print was gilt along the top edge, inscribed in pencil "an additional plate," and numbered "9" in pencil as the last plate in the volume. Also inscribed "end" and "14" in pencil on the verso.
InscribedInscribed in pencil: an additional plate Inscribed in pencil: 9 [indicating the last plate in the Library copy of "The Song of Los", from which it was removed in 1953] Inscribed on the verso in pencil: end [and] 14 Watermarked: 1794 / J WHATMAN
MarkingsWatermarked: 1794 / J WHATMAN
Credit LineThe Huntington Library, Art Museum, and Botanical Gardens
Label TextEtched c. 1793, printed c. 1796. Albion, a traditional personification of England, is for Blake a representation of universal humanity. Here he rises above the dark earth in a burst of light, his ideal human form fully displayed.
Status
Not on view
Object number000.124
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The Night of Enitharmon's Joy
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Illustrated manuscript of Genesis : second title page
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ca. 1826-1827
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ca. 1784 or later
Object number: 82.36
A Title Page for "The Grave"
William Blake
1806
Object number: 000.30
Illustrated manuscript of Genesis : Cain fleeing from the body of Abel
William Blake
ca. 1826-1827
Object number: 000.41