Beginning with Blake

My love of William Blake dates back to my art school days when he fitted in with all that rebellion, mysticism and downright morbid angst to which spotty youth is so prone. Bedsits with Athena posters of Blake's engraving of Newton, funny cigarettes and vile smelling joss sticks ... those were the days... Blake spans such a wonderful period of English history, being born just before Romanticism really got underway , in 1757 and dying in 1827.

A dyed in the wool Londoner, he nevertheless has a connection to my favourite county, Sussex, having lived in the idyllic village of Felpham for three years (1800-1803) during which time he produced the strangely wondrous words for Jerusalem. The cottage, then called Rose Cottage, still stands but is privately owned.
So I have decided it is to be my next collage capture.

Here is the roughest of rough beginnings:

And here is an engraving of the building by the great man himself:

I think the blue is too strong. I want to keep to the true Blakean palette. That means a lot of whittling down of cuttings scraps ... watch this space!