Ink and watercolour on paper. verso: graphite 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>
Good Farmer Probably Parable Wheat and Tares Rough Two or Three Figures in a Landscape
Bequeathed by Miss Alice G.E. Carthew 1940
actions: postures and motions
adults
agriculture and fishing
angel
arm / arms raised
Bible: New Testament
child
children
Christ
farmer
farmland
flying
hand / hands raised
harvesting
Judaeo-Christian imagery
kneeling
landscape
Last Judgement
man
Matthew, chapter 13
parable
people
plants and flowers
religion and belief
universal religious imagery
wheat
woman
work and occupations
<p>This pen and wash drawing is probably inspired by the biblical story of the wheat and the tares (weeds). Blake shows a Christ-like figure in the centre, appearing to differentiate between the two kneeling groups of people. In the background, a figure emerges from a threatening dark cloud, perhaps casting judgement on the group of figures below. This story is from the Gospel of St Matthew, when Jesus used the imagery of the harvest to describe the last judgement. Blake explored this subject in seven sketches in the 1780s.</p><p><em>Gallery label, October 2023</em></p>
paper unique ink watercolour graphite
13 May 2013 – 6 April 2015
2015-04-06
13 May 2013 – 6 April 2015
2015-04-06
2013-05-13
Tate Britain (London, UK)
http://www.tate.org.uk/britain/
2013-05-13
William Blake
Collection based display
11 September 2019 – 2 February 2020
2020-02-02
11 September 2019 – 2 February 2020
2020-02-02
2019-09-11
Tate Britain (London, UK)
http://www.tate.org.uk/britain/
2019-09-11
William Blake: The Artist
Exhibition
17 April 2023 – 12 May 2024
2024-05-12
17 April 2023 – 12 May 2024
2024-05-12
2023-04-17
Tate Britain (London, UK)
http://www.tate.org.uk/britain/
2023-04-17
Blake
Collection based display
The Good Farmer, Probably the Parable of the Wheat and the Tares. Verso: Rough Sketch of Two or Three Figures in a Landscape
support: 267 × 375 mm
Frame: 430 X 527 mm
Bequeathed by Miss Alice G.E. Carthew 1940
<div class="text">
<p>This pen and wash drawing is probably inspired by the biblical story of the wheat and the tares (weeds). Blake shows a Christ-like figure in the centre, appearing to differentiate between the two kneeling groups of people. In the background, a figure emerges from a threatening dark cloud, perhaps casting judgement on the group of figures below. This story is from the Gospel of St Matthew, when Jesus used the imagery of the harvest to describe the last judgement. Blake explored this subject in seven sketches in the 1780s. </p>
</div>

Display caption
2023-10-26T00:00:00
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-good-farmer-probably-the-parable-of-the-wheat-and-the-tares-verso-rough-sketch-n05198" title="View the details of this artwork"><span>N05198</span></a> <b>The Good Farmer, Probably the Parable of the Wheat and the Tares,</b> <i>c.</i> 1780–85 (recto)
<br/><b>Rough Sketch of Two or Three Figures in a Landscape</b> <i>c.</i> 1780–85 (verso)
<br/></p>
<p>N 05198 / B 123
<br/>Recto: pen and wash; Verso: pencil; on paper 267×375 (10 1/2×14 3/4)
<br/>Inscribed on verso, not by Blake, ‘Sketch/by Blake R.A.’ b.c. and ‘N<sup>o</sup>.9./4.11.0’ b.r.
<br/>Bequeathed by Miss Alice G.E. Carthew 1940
<br/>PROVENANCE ...; Miss Carthew by 1918 (letter in Tate Gallery files)
<br/>LITERATURE Keynes <i>Bible</i> 1957, p.34 no.118, recto repr.; Butlin 1981, p.47 no.123, recto pl.141, verso pl.166; David Bindman, review of Butlin 1981 in <i>Burlington Magazine</i>, CXXV, 1983, p.371
<br/></p>
<p>Inscribed on the back, not by Blake, are the words ‘Sketch by Blake R.A. [?]’; the last letters are unclear and Blake never was a Royal <a class="glossarylinktopopup" data-gtm-destination="article-page" data-gtm-name="body_text_link" href="http://www.tate.org.uk/learn/online-resources/glossary/a/academy" title="Glossary definition for 'Academy'"><span>Academician</span></a> although he did exhibit there.
<br/>
<br/>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/d/drawing" title="Glossary definition for 'Drawing'"><span>drawing</span></a> on 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/r/recto-verso" title="Glossary definition for 'Recto / Verso'"><span>recto</span></a> is typical of Blake's rather crude pen and wash drawings of the early 1780s. It is one of a series of drawings in which Blake worked out 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/c/composition" title="Glossary definition for 'Composition'"><span>composition</span></a> of a subject showing a cornfield with a Christ-like figure as chief protagonist with other figures beseeching his aid or raising their arms imploringly to heaven; most if not all show a scene of destruction in the distance (Butlin 1981, nos.120–5, pls. 135–142). The Tate Gallery drawing seems to have been executed after the two drawings on one sheet belonging to Robert N. Essick (Butlin no.122) and before that belonging to the Humanities Research Center, University of Texas, Austin (Butlin no.124).
<br/>
<br/>The subject of this series of drawings has been much debated. One of them (Butlin no.121) has been tentatively identified as an illustration to Ruth, ii, 1–17, but the figure of a woman gleaning that suggested this identification disappears between the recto and the verso of the next drawing in the series (Butlin no.122). William Rossetti gives two alternative interpretations for the more elaborate drawing that seems to conclude the series (Butlin no.124), firstly as ‘The Parable of the Sower’ (Matthew, xii, 18–23) with, behind, ‘an angel in the sky ... sowing the seed’, and secondly as ‘“Christ as the Good Farmer”, distributing His produce to the poor; ... a group in the background shows a hard-hearted farmer whose goods are being destroyed by lightning’ (1863, p.267 list 2 no.76, and 1880, p.265 list 2 no.100). According to Irene Langridge (<i>William Blake, a Study of His Life and Art Work</i>, 1904, pp.185–6), D.G. Rossetti and Frederic Shields suggested that the drawings illustrate I Samuel, xii, 16–19, in which Samuel calls upon the Lord to strike the harvest with thunder and rain as a judgement on the people for wanting a king. Michael Tolley has suggested (in correspondence) a more general title, ‘Pray ye therefore the Lord of the Harvest’ (Matthew, ix, 38), while accepting that there is a link with I Samuel, xii, 16–19.
<br/>
<br/>Most recently David Bindman has suggested that the drawings illustrate the Parable of the wheat and the tares (Matthew, xiii, 24–30) in which the good farmer allows both the wheat and the tares to ripen so that at the harvest they can be separated and the wheat gathered and the tares burnt. In Christ's explanation of this Parable ‘The field is the world; the good seed are the children of the kingdom; but the tares are the children of the wicked ones; the enemy that sowed them is the devil; the harvest is the end of the world and the reapers are the angels. As therefore the tares are gathered and burned in the fire, so shall it be in the end of this world’ (Matthew, xiii, 37–43). This apocalyptic theme has parallels in some of Blake's other designs of the mid 1780s, and reflects his links with other Millenarians (for Blake and Millenarianism see Morton D. Paley, ‘William Blake, the Prince of the Hebrews, and the Woman Clothed with the Sun’, in Paley and Phillips 1973, pp.260–93, Bindman 1977, pp.31–3, and Bindman 1982, pp.16–20, 74–6).
<br/>
<br/>In style this group of drawings seems to date from the earlier 1780s, preceding the fully accomplished <a class="glossarylinktopopup" data-gtm-destination="article-page" data-gtm-name="body_text_link" href="http://www.tate.org.uk/learn/online-resources/glossary/n/neoclassicism" title="Glossary definition for 'Neoclassicism'"><span>neo-classicism</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/w/watercolour" title="Glossary definition for 'Watercolour'"><span>watercolour</span></a> illustrations to the story of Joseph exhibited at the Royal Academy in 1785 (Butlin nos.155–7, colour pls.183–5). The drawing of ‘St. John the Evangelist before a Vision of Christ’ on the back of the first drawing in the series, one of the two in the British Museum (Butlin no.120 recto, the verso repr. pl.144) was <a class="glossarylinktopopup" data-gtm-destination="article-page" data-gtm-name="body_text_link" href="http://www.tate.org.uk/learn/online-resources/glossary/e/engraving" title="Glossary definition for 'Engraving'"><span>engraved</span></a> early in 1782 but was not necessarily done at the same time as the drawing on the recto.
<br/>
<br/>The drawing on the back seems to show three figures seated in animated conversation in a <a class="glossarylinktopopup" data-gtm-destination="article-page" data-gtm-name="body_text_link" href="http://www.tate.org.uk/learn/online-resources/glossary/l/landscape" title="Glossary definition for 'Landscape'"><span>landscape</span></a>, but no specific subject can be suggested. In the top right-hand corner, to be seen with 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> turned at a right-angle, is what seems to be a separate sketch of three stooping figures, perhaps connected with the drawing on the recto.
<br/>
<br/>Before restoration this drawing bore green and brown stains matching those to be found on a number of Blake's early drawings including two further ones from the ‘Good Farmer’ series, suggesting that they were all together in Blake's studio (the drawings are Butlin 1981, nos.94, 104A, 123, 124, 139A and 186).</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
2004-10-07T00:00:00
catalogue-entry
CATALOGUE_ENTRY
actions: postures and motions adults agriculture and fishing angel arm / arms raised Bible: New Testament child children Christ farmer farmland flying hand / hands raised harvesting Judaeo-Christian imagery kneeling landscape Last Judgement man Matthew, chapter 13 parable people plants and flowers religion and belief universal religious imagery wheat woman work and occupations