Support the Blake's Cottage Campaign!
William Blake was a visionary poet and painter, and one of the most radical thinkers Britain has ever seen. Today his works are read, studied and loved all around the world but other than a handful of museum collections, nowhere in Britain celebrates his extraordinary craftmanship and creativity.
Blake’s Cottage in Felpham, West Sussex is where he discovered ‘England’s Green and Pleasant Land’ yet it was also where he was arrested and tried for sedition.
We are raising this money to save and protect the Cottage in perpetuity. Time is of the essence.
With your support this beautiful building will become a Blake centre that celebrates Blake, and welcomes visitors, poets, artists and scholars to continue his legacy, creating new work that would honour his claim, ‘The Imagination is not a State: it is The Human Existence itself’.
Blake’s Cottage campaign is endorsed by Sir Andrew Motion, Philip Pullman, Stephen Fry, Tracy Chevalier, Russell Brand, Alan Moore, Cosmo Sheldrake, Jeremy Reed, Gary Lachman, James Harpur, Andrea McLean, Guy Pearson, Neil Gaiman, Chris Orr, and You.
The Blake Society plan for the Cottage has multiple stages – but to begin, they must acquire this building. It has been privately owned by one family since 1928. If sold to another private owner, there is no way of knowing when it will ever be available again. There is also substantial work needed that really should be carried out authentically and to enable the recovering of lost skills.
Blake came from the dissenting tradition. During his lifetime, the dissenters were men and women who left the Church of England, and opposed state involvement in religious faith. They protested against repressive law, and sought to create their own religious societies. They argued for a fair economy and a heaven on this earth.
Blake’s poetic mythology shows how these struggles for freedom can be a rich and varied source of creativity. The dissenting imagination is engaged with the impact of political and religious institutions on everyday life. Artists fueled by it question the structures of our society and challenge both the limitations imposed by laws and the internal constraints of our ‘mind-forg’d manacles’. Their work continues to engage with struggles at the heart of society today.
The Cottage is to be an exemplar of a way to live a life through courage and creativity. We are inviting support from everyone who is strengthened by the knowledge that somewhere in the world such a place exists; a home for the prophetic imagination in England’s Green and Pleasant Land. Visit the Blake Society website for more information on Blake and the campaign.
Please support the campaign by giving directly through justgiving or by contacting Tim Heath, Chair of The Blake Society London, or in Felpham at info@thebigblakeproject.org.uk. Through the Big Blake Project there are a number of further opportunities to give, including: bid for one of 5 personally inscribed signed copy of Tyger on the Crooked Road; purchase an acoustic version of Jerusalem sung by the diva Katherine Ellis; two unique poetry events in Blackwell’s London and Felpham are currently being organised. All money raised goes directly to Blake Cottage. Enjoy the play Waiting for Robert 31 Jan in Blackwell’s, Oxford and watch this space …….
Rachel Searle – The Big Blake Project
27/01/15
