S+ Stimulant: Sparks Flying from Flaming Red Hair

 

The clip above is taken from the play In Lambeth, and features actor Mark Rylance portraying a young William Blake.  Blake was not only a poet, but also painter, and printmaker. In the clip, Blake struggles to come to terms with religion, politics, and science, and only resolves these challenging issues by listening to, and channelling, his ‘inner voice’. Perhaps it’s thanks to this immense faith Blake had in his own creative energy that his work has remained timeless and inspiring 200 years on.

Despite his later immense popularity, Blake was largely unrecognised during his own lifetime. His radical views on religion, politics, and sexuality distanced him from the mainstream artistic movements of the period.

It is perhaps because of this that Blake’s work is so diverse, unique, and difficult to classify. Characterised as a ‘glorious luminary’, Blake was a Romantic who not only followed his imagination but trusted it so implicitly that he recreated the universe around him using his art and ideas.

The clip is 4 minutes long and well worth a watch.

 

W.K. 2014