Ink and watercolour on paper
Tate Collection
Works with images
General Collection
Collection
<a href="https://www.tate.org.uk/art/artists/william-blake-39" aria-label="More by William Blake" data-gtm-name="header_link_artist" data-gtm-destination="page--artist">William Blake</a>
River Life
Bequeathed by W. Graham Robertson 1949
actions: expressive
actions: postures and motions
adults
architecture
arts and entertainment
astronomy
bank
bending forward
Bible: New Testament
birth to death
building - non-specific
child
children
Christ
door
emotional states and conditions
experience - musician in pink
features
figure
fine arts and music
floating
flying
holding hands
innocence - musician in white
instrument, pipe
leisure and pastimes
male
man
marriage
marriage - embracing figures
music
music and entertainment
musician
New Jerusalem - bride
nudes
objects
people
religion and belief
religious
Revelation, chapter 22
river
Saints
sex and relationships
society
society
St John the Divine
stages of life
sun
symbols and personifications
townscapes / man-made features
tree
water: inland
woman
work and occupations
<p>This work illustrates lines from the Book of Revelation. The River of Life flows from the throne of God to the Tree of Life.</p><p>It is also a rare example of how Blake presented his watercolours: he drew the washline border between ruled ink lines.</p><p>The yellow tone of the paper is the result of over-exposure to light. This caused some of the original blue paint (indigo perhaps) to fade; the fuzzy band of Prussian blue on the lower edge, and spots of the same colour in the river, were added later by someone trying to ‘correct’ this fading.</p><p><em>Gallery label, September 2004</em></p>
paper unique ink watercolour
24 March 2003 – 17 November 2003
2003-11-17
Tate Britain (London, UK)
http://www.tate.org.uk/britain/
2003-03-24
Blake and Illustration
Collection based display
24 November 2003 – 22 November 2004
2004-11-22
10 November 2003
2003-11-10
Tate Britain (London, UK)
http://www.tate.org.uk/britain/
2003-11-24
William Blake the Painter at Work
Collection based display
16 February 2011 – 21 August 2011
2011-08-21
16 February 2011 – 21 August 2011
2011-08-21
2011-02-16
Tate Britain (London, UK)
http://www.tate.org.uk/britain/
2011-02-16
Watercolour
Exhibition
13 May 2013 – 6 October 2013
2013-10-06
13 May 2013 – 6 October 2013
2013-10-06
2013-05-13
Tate Britain (London, UK)
http://www.tate.org.uk/britain/
2013-05-13
Landscape in Blake
Collection based display
20 April 2015 – 7 May 2017
2017-05-07
20 April 2015 – 7 May 2017
2017-05-07
2015-04-20
Tate Britain (London, UK)
http://www.tate.org.uk/britain/
2015-04-20
William Blake
Collection based display
15 November 2021 – 10 April 2022
2022-04-10
15 November 2021 – 10 April 2022
2022-04-10
2021-11-15
Tate Britain (London, UK)
http://www.tate.org.uk/britain/
2021-11-15
Poetical Bodies: Works on Paper by Blake and his Contemporaries
Collection based display
The River of Life
image: 305 × 336 mm
support: 442 × 432 mm
Bequeathed by W. Graham Robertson 1949
<div class="para1">
<span class="text15">This work illustrates lines from the Book </span><span class="text3">
of Revelation. The River of Life flows from  the throne of      God to the Tree of Life. </span>
</div>
<div class="para1">
<span class="text3">
<br/> </span>
</div>
<div class="para1">
<span class="text3">It is also a rare example of how Blake presented his      <a class="glossarylinktopopup" data-gtm-destination="article-page" data-gtm-name="body_text_link" href="http://www.tate.org.uk/learn/online-resources/glossary/w/watercolour" title="Glossary definition for 'Watercolour'"><span>watercolours</span></a>: he drew the washline border between ruled <a class="glossarylinktopopup" data-gtm-destination="article-page" data-gtm-name="body_text_link" href="http://www.tate.org.uk/learn/online-resources/glossary/i/ink" title="Glossary definition for 'Ink'"><span>ink</span></a> lines.   </span>
</div>
<div class="para1">
<span class="text14">The yellow <a class="glossarylinktopopup" data-gtm-destination="article-page" data-gtm-name="body_text_link" href="http://www.tate.org.uk/learn/online-resources/glossary/t/tone" title="Glossary definition for 'Tone'"><span>tone</span></a> of the <a class="glossarylinktopopup" data-gtm-destination="article-page" data-gtm-name="body_text_link" href="http://www.tate.org.uk/learn/online-resources/glossary/p/paper" title="Glossary definition for 'Paper'"><span>paper</span></a> is the result of      over-exposure to light. This caused some of</span><span class="text3"> </span><span class="text15">the original blue paint (indigo perhaps) to </span><span class="text14">fade; the fuzzy band of Prussian blue on the </span><span class="text3">lower edge, and spots of the same colour  in the river, were      added later by someone trying to ‘correct’ this fading.  </span>
</div>

Display caption
2004-09-09T00:00:00
display-caption
DISPLAY_CAPTION
<p><a class="acno-pop" data-gtm-destination="page--artwork" data-gtm-name="body_text_link" href="https://www.tate.org.uk/art/artworks/blake-the-river-of-life-n05887" title="View the details of this artwork"><span>N05887</span></a> <b>The River of Life</b> <i>c.</i>1805
<br/></p>
<p>N 05887 / B 525
<br/>Pen and watercolour 305×336 (12×13 1/4)
<br/>Signed ‘WB inv’ in monogram b.l. and inscr. ‘Rev: cxxii v 1 &amp; 2’ b.r.
<br/>Bequeathed by W. Graham Robertson 1949
<br/>PROVENANCE Thomas Butts; Thomas Butts jun.; Capt. F.J. Butts; his widow, sold April 1906 through Carfax to W. Graham Robertson
<br/>EXHIBITED BFAC 1876 (94); Carfax 1904 (21); Carfax 1906 (48); <i>Century of Art</i> Grafton Galleries 1911 (127); Tate Gallery (36), Manchester (35), Nottingham (24) and Edinburgh (31) 1913–14; <i>British Empire Exhibition</i> Palace of Arts, Wembley 1924 (N.8, repr. <i>Illustrated Souvenir</i> p.59); BFAC 1927 (33, colour pl. 1); <i>British Art</i> RA 1934 (787; 706); Whitechapel 1934 (54); <i>Two Centuries of English Art</i> Amsterdam 1936 (187); <i>British Painting</i> Paris 1938 (161); Paris, Antwerp, Zurich and Tate Gallery 1947 (23); Bournemouth, Southampton and Brighton 1949 (40)
<br/>LITERATURE Rossetti 1863, p.237 no.215, and 1880, pp.251–2 no.245; Joseph Wicksteed <i>Blake's River of Life: Its Poetic Undertones</i> n.d. [1949]; Preston 1952, pp.70–1 no.18, pl.18; Roe 1953, p.185 n.; Keynes <i>Bible</i> 1957, p.50 no.170 repr.; Blunt 1959, pp.72–3, pl.38b; Raine 1968, 1, p.98, pl.40; Roe in Rosenfeld 1969, p.453 n.53; Tolley in <i>Blake Newsletter</i>, VI, 1972–3, p.30; Bindman 1977, pp.143, 165; Klonsky 1977, p.106, repr. in colour; Butlin 1981, pp.371–2, colour pl.586; Warner 1984, pp.147–9, pl.85
<br/></p>
<p>This is an illustration to Revelation, xxii, 1–2. In the text only the River of Life proceeding from the Throne of God is mentioned, together with the Tree of Life with its twelve different fruits. The figures were added by Blake. Wicksteed identifies these figures as Christ leading two children through the Stream of Time towards the Divine Sun. To the right the Bride (the New Jerusalem) hovers in a stooping position in order to scoop up water from the River of Life. The river runs between and divides the two banks of Innocence on the left and Experience; each side has its own musician, clad in white and pink respectively. Seen above the figure of Christ is St John the Divine, haloed by the divine sun which is surrounded by figures symbolising eternal marriage.
<br/>
<br/>William Rossetti, in an annotation to his lists in his own copy of Gilchrist's <i>Life</i> now in the Houghton Library, equates this <a class="glossarylinktopopup" data-gtm-destination="article-page" data-gtm-name="body_text_link" href="http://www.tate.org.uk/learn/online-resources/glossary/w/watercolour" title="Glossary definition for 'Watercolour'"><span>watercolour</span></a> with the ‘finished picture from the <i>Melamorphoses</i> [of Ovid], after Giulio Romano’, which Samuel Palmer, in a letter to Alexander Gilchrist of 23 August 1855 (Gilchrist 1863, 1, p.301), said hung in Blake's room. This is clearly a mistake, particularly as the watercolour shares a common <a class="glossarylinktopopup" data-gtm-destination="article-page" data-gtm-name="body_text_link" href="http://www.tate.org.uk/learn/online-resources/glossary/p/provenance" title="Glossary definition for 'Provenance'"><span>provenance</span></a> with the other biblical watercolours painted for Thomas Butts, and William Rossetti did not include this insertion in the 1880 edition of his lists.
<br/>
<br/>A strip of blue along the bottom edge, which was formerly covered by an old mount, indicates that much colour has been lost by fading over the rest of the watercolour.</p>
<p>
<br/><b>Published in:</b>
<br/>Martin Butlin, <i>William Blake 1757-1827</i>, Tate Gallery Collections, V, London 1990
<br/></p>

Catalogue entry
2004-10-08T00:00:00
catalogue-entry
CATALOGUE_ENTRY
actions: expressive actions: postures and motions adults architecture arts and entertainment astronomy bank bending forward Bible: New Testament birth to death building - non-specific child children Christ door emotional states and conditions experience - musician in pink features figure fine arts and music floating flying holding hands innocence - musician in white instrument, pipe leisure and pastimes male man marriage marriage - embracing figures music music and entertainment musician New Jerusalem - bride nudes objects people religion and belief religious Revelation, chapter 22 river Saints sex and relationships society society stages of life St John the Divine sun symbols and personifications townscapes / man-made features tree water: inland woman work and occupations