by John Hanson
LIS 446
William Blake (1863), painting by John Linnel
Retrieved from http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/William_Blake
The English visionary, engraver, artist and poet William Blake (1757 - 1827) is recognized as the primogenitor of the Artist Book/Livre d'Artiste. According to Wikipedia's (2013) article on the Artist's book, "artist's books are works of art realized in the form of a book", ..."often produced in small editions" or "produced as one of a kind objects" and "most writers on the subject cite the English visionary artist and poet William Blake (1757–1827) as the earliest direct antecedent." The livre d'artiste is a deluxe edition, finely crafted book, the elements of which "included large sized format, hand coloring and printing, fine binding and the use of rare materials" and is distinguished by the collaborative nature "not simply between artist and poet but also between printer, designer, typographer, binder, papermaker and dealer" (Reed Digital Collection, 2013). I decided to take a look at Blake's Songs of Innocence and Songs of Experience as an example of the livre d'artiste.
Blake is known to have had visions of angels and the prophet Ezekiel as a child, so it came as no surprise that as an adult he told friends that his departed brother "appeared to him in a dream and told him about a way to print his poems and illustrations as relief etchings without typography" (Meggs, p.121), also known as illuminated printing. Blake is credited with being both author and printer of Songs of Innocence and Songs of Experience, in small editions, but its known that his wife Catherine helped with hand-coloring pages or hand-bounding the books. Erdman (1974) states that there are "twenty-one origianl copies of Songs of Innocence alone and twenty-seven of the combined grouping are known to exist, in nearly thirty public and private collections" (p. 41).
There is a website, blakearchive.org, which has a list of known original copies of Songs of Innocence and Songs of Experience and details of each copy's completeness. The owners include a range of museums, libraries and private collectors. The British Museum, Princeton University Library, Morgan Library and Museum of New York City, Library of Congress, Harvard University's Widener Library and Maurice Sendak are several that hold copies.
I checked out the resources at Simmons Beatley Library and found The Illuminated Blake by Erdman and The Complete Graphic Works of William Blake by David Bindman, both available for circulation. The descriptions of the books on the Simmons online catalog mention there are illustrations but doesn't state that they are all in black and white. I think any catalog of a book about graphics or "illuminations" should be clear about whether or not the illustrations are in black and white or color or both. Both books are still great resources for familiarization and inspiration with Blake's works. The Boston Public Library has available for "in library use only", a facsimile edition of all the color plates of the Songs of Innocence and Songs of Experience (1789) copy held by the Library of Congress. The BPL provides good information in the online catalog description and full record entries for this edition. A basic search for the control number, 48031328, in the Library of Congress online catalog will bring you to a record of their 1789 edition.
I thought it would be interesting if I could get a glimpse of the physical object of Harvard University's copy.
I searched Harvard's website. I found a digitized version of their copy of Songs of Innocence and Songs of Experience. At 2:50pm on September 21, I texted Harvard's "Ask a Librarian" to find out if the general public can view the physical copy of the book. The response, at 2:55pm, was to contact the Houghton Library and that they were not sure if they can retrieve a special item today. I called the phone number provided but couldn't get through. I heard ringing then some strange sounds and then the call ended. I searched online for the Houghton Library reading room and one needs to register for a Special Borrower's card. Click the link for more details about the Houghton Library reading room and a video tutorial on handling special collections.
For our viewing pleasure I've provided two different digitized versions of the title page of the book and links of electronic editions.
The blakearchive.org has links to over a dozen electronic editions:
Retrieved from the Fitzwilliam Museum, http://www.blakearchive.org/exist/blake/archive/object.xq?objectid=songsie.aa.illbk.01&java=no
Retrieved from the Library of Congress, electronic edition, http://www.blakearchive.org/exist/blake/archive/object.xq?objectid=songsie.aa.illbk.01&java=no
In addition to viewing the electronic versions, I recommend reading The Illuminated Blake (1974), which provides great plate by plate commentary of Blake's illuminated works. Erdman (1974) points out interesting details such as near the first S "one thin figure stands, holding up a right hand for our attention and another sits reading" and commentary about the variance in Eve's facial expression, e.g. " looking back up at him, enigmatically or seductively, or holding her eyes shut,...but sometimes hiding her face toward the earth" (p.42). Some of the details, which are lost in Erdman's book, can be seen in the digitized examples above.
The Blake Archive website provides copy information on a select number of copies. There is copy information for the Library of Congress' copy. Here, the documentation includes composition date, object order, leaf size, watermark, provenance and present location. William Blake is given as "author, inventor, delineator, etcher, printer, colorist" (Eaves, Essick, Viscomi, 2010) and his wife Catherine is given as printer. The website also allows one to enlarge the image and provides excellent illustration description and textual transcription. The Blake Archive treats the Artist Book as a unique object and provides granular metadata to increase knowledge of and access to the object. Compare this information with the information in the LOC Full Record. I didn't see a mention of a watermark in the LOC record. This could be an important detail for watermark enthusiasts. Watermarks were being used in the early days of printing in the West. It seems that libraries are treating the livre d'artiste as a fine art object but are still lacking in detailed metadata.
Another good resource for looking at the book and other rare books in electronic form is the rarebookroom.org. This shows every page and the binding of the book.
Question: What is good research when dealing with Artist Book's, especially one like Songs of Innocence and Songs of Experience, which has been closely analyzed and annotated? At what level does the researcher need to see the original work? Is the facsimile reproduction in the Boston Public Library or an electronic version suffice for writing a scholarly article? What is the best practice/schema to catalog any illustrated object?
References
Artist book. (n.d.). In Wikipedia online. Retrieved from http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Artist%27s_book
Erdman, D. V. (1974). The Illuminated Blake. Garden City, NY: Anchor Press / Doubleday.
Livre D'artiste. (n.d.). In Reed Digital Collection online. Retrieved from http://cdm.reed.edu/cdm4/artbooks/livre.php
Meggs, P. B. (1998, 3rd ed.). A History of Graphic Design. New York, NY: John Wiley & Sons, Inc.
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