Lunchbox Lecture: Divine Representation in William Blake’s Engravings
CERES-Palais, Raum "Ruhrpott" (4.13)
Lunchbox Lecture by Prof. Dr. Ben Myers (Professor of Theology and Literature, Graduate Research School Director / Alphacrucis University College, Sydney, Australia)
"Divine Representation in William Blake’s Engravings"
This lecture argues that William Blake’s engravings on the Book of Job (1826) constitute a sustained argument about the problems and possibilities of divine representation. Blake’s multimodal engravings combine word image to explore the transformation of Job’s perception of the divine. The work advances different representations of the divine – for example, God as lawgiver, as providential overseer, and as distant father – only to critique and expose them as warped projections of the pious mind. The ultimate disappearance of any visible God-figure from the work is central to Blake’s theological argument about the representability of the divine.
