The Pastorals of Virgil, Eclogue I: The Blasted Tree - William Blake
Archival giclée
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Description
A striking wood engraving by William Blake, created for his 1821 illustrations of Virgil's Pastorals, featuring a gnarled tree under a crescent moon.
This wood engraving is one of the seventeen illustrations William Blake produced for Robert John Thornton's 1821 edition of The Pastorals of Virgil. It represents a departure from the polished, academic style of the period. Blake utilised the wood block with a directness that prioritised expressive mark-making over technical refinement. The image depicts a gnarled, blasted tree silhouetted against a dark, nocturnal sky, with a crescent moon providing the primary light source. The stark contrast between the black ink and the white paper creates a sense of atmospheric tension.
Blake's approach to this commission was unconventional. He ignored the standard conventions of cross-hatching and smooth tonal transitions, opting instead for bold, white-line incisions that define the form of the tree and the texture of the ground. This technique gives the work a raw, immediate quality. The composition is compressed, forcing the viewer to focus on the twisted anatomy of the tree and the rhythmic lines of the landscape.
These small prints were highly regarded by later artists, including Samuel Palmer and Edward Calvert, who formed the group known as the Ancients. They admired the visionary quality of Blake's work and his ability to imbue a simple pastoral scene with psychological weight. The print serves as an example of Blake's late-career experimentation with the woodblock medium, where he sought to capture the spirit of the text rather than provide a literal illustration. The resulting image is a study in light and shadow, demonstrating his mastery of graphic economy. By stripping away unnecessary detail, Blake achieves a powerful visual statement that remains distinct within his broader body of work.
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Each print is produced to order using 12-colour giclée printing on FSC-certified archival paper. Designed in Britain and printed at your nearest production hub to reduce waste and speed up delivery.
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Specific Features
Every Solis piece is made to order with archival, gallery-quality materials built to last.
- Museum-grade giclée printing for rich, fade-resistant colour
- Archival matte fine-art paper, FSC-certified
- Multiple sizes and framing options available
- Frames in black, natural wood, dark wood or white
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To keep your artwork looking its best:
- Dust gently with a soft, dry cloth
- Avoid prolonged direct sunlight
- Never use liquid cleaners on the print or canvas surface
- Keep in a dry, room-temperature space
- Handle prints with clean, dry hands
Materials & Sizing
Museum-grade giclée on FSC-certified archival matte paper, with framed and canvas options.
- Paper sizes: A4, A3, A2, A1, A0 and B2 (50×70 cm)
- Canvas: XS (20×30 cm) to Large (60×90 cm)
- Frames: black, natural wood, dark wood or white
The Pastorals of Virgil, Eclogue I: The Blasted Tree - William Blake
Artist Biography
William Blake
He married Catherine Boucher in 1782. She was illiterate at the time and signed the marriage register with an X. He taught her to read, write, and engrave, and she became his collaborator for the next forty-five years: mixing paint, operating the printing press, hand-colouring plates, and binding the finished pages into covers.
Their working method was Blake's own invention, revealed to him (he said) in a dream by the spirit of his dead brother Robert. Relief etching reversed the standard printmaking process: instead of cutting lines into copper, Blake wrote and drew on the plate in acid-resistant varnish, then dissolved the surrounding metal with acid, leaving text and image raised. This allowed him to compose poetry and illustration simultaneously on a single plate, print them together, then hand-colour each sheet in watercolour. Every copy was therefore unique. Songs of Innocence and of Experience was produced this way. He sold fewer than thirty copies during his lifetime.
In 1803, he physically threw a soldier named John Schofield out of his garden in Felpham. He was charged with assault and with uttering treasonable expressions against the King. He was acquitted at the Chichester assizes in January 1804.
Newton, painted in 1795, shows the scientist as a young man with the body of a Greek god, bent forward at the bottom of a dark ocean, fixing his gaze on a pair of compasses, measuring and drawing on a scroll that appears to project from his own head. It is a painting about the limits of reason: beautiful, precise, and missing everything beyond the edge of the paper. The Ancient of Days, from the same period, depicts his mythological figure Urizen crouching at the edge of a void, reaching down with a compass to measure the darkness below.
He died on 12 August 1827, working on illustrations for Dante's Divine Comedy. He was buried at Bunhill Fields. The wider recognition came decades later.
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