The Crucifixion: Behold Thy Mother

Blake was perhaps the quintessential Romantic artist. Blake stressed the primacy of individual imagination and inspiration to the creative process, rejecting the Neoclassical emphasis on formal precision which had defined much 18th-century painting and poetry. Above all else, Blake scorned the contemporary culture of Enlightenment and industrialization, which stood for a mechanization and intellectual reductivism which he deplored.

For Blake, the Bible was the greatest work of poetry ever written, and comprised the basis of true art, as opposed to the false, pagan ideal of classicism. He had a loyal patron who commissioned him to create  a series of illustrations to the Bible that included about fifty tempera paintings  and more than eighty watercolors.  These focus on Old Testament prefigurations of Christ, the life of Christ, and apocalyptic subjects from the Book of Revelation, although the series’ exact program and its intended display remain unclear.

A traditional and popular scene from the Passion, and refers to the gospel of John, chapter 19 verses 26-27:
When Jesus therefore saw his mother, and the disciple standing by, whom he loved, he saith unto his mother, “Woman, behold thy son!” Then saith he to the disciple, “Behold thy mother!” And from that hour that disciple took her unto his own home.

This work is ink and watercolour on paper, measures 41.3 x 30 cm, and is housed in The Tate Gallery