European Art and Old Masters

The present drawing – a rare original work by the British artist, poet, visionary, and mystic William Blake - has been known and recorded since its creation, circa 1819-20. It depicts King Solomon and is one of three recorded head and shoulders bust portraits by Blake as recorded by Butlin. In Rossetti’s ‘Descriptive Catalogue’ of 1863, Solomon is described as: “Age about forty; a piercing, reflective, sensuous Jewish head, the eye exceedingly far back from the line of the nose, the chin blunt and very large. Admirable.” While Pre-Raphaelite stalwart Dante Gabriel Rossetti’s publication was a tribute to Blake’s genius, the present work shows the close ties between the Blake and the landscape and portrait painter, John Linnell (1792-1882). It is, according to Butlin, inscribed ‘SOLOMON’ by Linell at bottom center. This drawing is also inscribed ‘J Linnell from Mr Blake’ at bottom right. About a year before Blake drew the present work, he and Linnell first met and the two would remain friends until Blake’s death in 1827. While Blake was 61 and Linnell only 26 when they were introduced, Linnell played a pivotal role in the final years of Blake’s life, serving as a patron to Blake, and giving the artist a renewed relevancy, commissioning Blake to complete a set of engravings for the ‘Book of Job’ and purchasing Blake’s watercolors illustrating ‘Paradise Regained.’ Linnell also introduced Blake to a younger generation of English artists, including his future son-in-law, Samuel Palmer. A miniature watercolor on ivory depicting Blake and painted by Linnell is in the collection of The Fitzwilliam Museum, Cambridge.