The Laborious Passage along the Rocks 1824 - 1827

Curator: William Blake's "The Laborious Passage along the Rocks," held in the Tate Collections, presents us with a landscape rendered in pencil and watercolour. Editor: It feels so ethereal, almost like a half-remembered dreamscape. The figures seem lost in this vast, unforgiving terrain. Curator: Note the contrast between the solid forms of the rocks and the swirling, atmospheric sky. The composition directs our eye towards the figures, positioned precariously on the craggy precipice. Editor: I wonder what's driving them. There's a sense of melancholy, yet maybe also a glimmer of hope emanating from the figure standing at the top. Curator: Blake often used such landscapes to symbolize spiritual journeys, and here we see echoes of Romanticism, but also a powerful individual symbolism. Editor: I'm left with a sense of the fragile beauty of existence, like we're all just trying to find our footing on this laborious passage. Curator: Precisely, and that is what makes Blake so enduring.