Was ist der Nutzen von William Blake?

years after Blake’s death, the question arises as to the relevance of his art and literature in a world plagued by climate change, nuclear threats, pandemics, and the rise of fascism. Shouldn’t we focus on the emergency rather than studying and enjoying the works of long-dead poets and painters? In the event of a fire in a museum, do we stroll through the galleries admiring the masterpieces or rush in to douse the flames? These are the questions that arise in the face of the art/politics dilemma.

William Blake was a poet and painter who faced this dilemma, but with the significant advantage of artistic and poetic genius. He was clued in to the exigencies of his time: war and revolution; immiseration of the masses and enrichment of the few; the rise of the fossil fuel economy; and grave threats to political and expressive freedom. To Blake, what mattered in both art and politics was radicalism, meaning getting to the heart of the matter, and imagination, freeing the mind to enable liberation.

In The Marriage of Heaven and Hell, Blake extolls the revolutionary virtues of energy, exuberance, spontaneity, excess, and imagination, and conjures a social and political order based on principles taught by Satan. Blake suggests that in revolutionary times, which he calls „ages of imagination,“ righteous anger and public protest can change the world. The poem was written and illustrated between 1790 and 1793 during a particularly tumultuous time in British history.

Blake’s works have not, for the most part, been turned into kitsch, with the single exception of his lines from the Preface to Milton that begin, „And did those feet in ancient times…“ which was turned into an Anglican hymn and misrepresented as an homage to Merry Old England. The reason Blake’s works were and still are of use to war protesters, advocates of queer liberation, prison abolitionists, and animal rights activists is that they are expressions of „honest indignation“ that keep alive the dream of an „age of imagination,“ i.e. revolution.

Blake stands on the side of the antis today who want to overturn hierarchies of class, race, gender, and species, abolish the repressive prison system, halt the destruction of Earth systems, and stop fascism. Blake was Antifa

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What’s the Use of William Blake?

William Blake, The First Book of Urizen, plate 4 (detail), 1794, British Museum. Fire in the museum What’s the use of William Blake? Or for that matter, what’s the use of any art and literature in an age of climate change, proxy wars, nuclear threat, pandemic, and the rise of fascism? Rather than study and enjoy works by long dead poets or painters, shouldn’t we focus on the emergency? If the museum is on fire, do we stroll the galleries, admiring the masterpieces or rush in and douse the flames? Though I’ve never had to rescue artworks from a burning museum, I’ve experienced the art vs politics problem for years. I was for almost four decades a professor of art

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