Where Is Isaac Newton? See It at Tate Modern, London

Q: Where can I see William Blake's Newton?

This color print is held at Tate Britain in London. The museum houses an extensive collection of Blake's visionary works, including his illuminated books and prophetic paintings.

Q: Why did Blake depict Newton negatively?

William Blake saw Newton as the embodiment of cold rationalism that ignored spiritual and imaginative truth. Blake believed excessive focus on measurement and science blinded humanity to deeper realities. The hunched figure, blind to the colorful rock behind him, illustrates this critique.

Q: What technique did Blake use for this print?

Blake created this as a color print with additional watercolor and ink applied by hand. He printed the basic image from a millboard, then worked over each impression individually. This hybrid technique gives the work its distinctive textured, painterly quality.

William Blake made this color print between 1795 and 1805, depicting Isaac Newton hunched naked on a rock, absorbed in geometric calculations with a pair of dividers. The work combines printing with hand-applied watercolor and ink, giving it a textured, almost spectral quality that sets it apart from conventional printmaking of the period.

Blake intended the image as a critique, not a celebration. For him, Newton represented the dangers of scientific rationalism, a mind so fixated on measurement and mathematics that it remained blind to imagination, spirituality, and the natural world. The great physicist sits with his back to the colorful rock behind him, oblivious to everything beyond his diagrams. Blake grouped this work with companion prints depicting Nebuchadnezzar and other figures he saw as spiritually limited.

The image has since become one of the most recognized symbols of the tension between science and Romanticism. Eduardo Paolozzi's massive bronze sculpture outside the British Library in London draws directly from this composition. The original print now belongs to the Tate Britain collection, where it continues to provoke debate about the relationship between reason and imagination.

This color print is held at Tate Britain in London. The museum houses an extensive collection of Blake's visionary works, including his illuminated books and prophetic paintings.

William Blake saw Newton as the embodiment of cold rationalism that ignored spiritual and imaginative truth. Blake believed excessive focus on measurement and science blinded humanity to deeper realities. The hunched figure, blind to the colorful rock behind him, illustrates this critique.

Blake created this as a color print with additional watercolor and ink applied by hand. He printed the basic image from a millboard, then worked over each impression individually. This hybrid technique gives the work its distinctive textured, painterly quality.

Eduardo Paolozzi's bronze sculpture outside the British Library directly recreates Blake's composition, showing Newton with his dividers. Installed in 1995, the twelve-foot statue transforms Blake's critique into a monumental figure that greets millions of library visitors annually.

Isaac Newton

Where to See It

The Artist

More by William Blake

Nebuchadnezzar

The Soldiers Casting Lots for Christ's Garments

Satan Calling Up his Legions

Glad Day or The Dance of Albion

Also at Tate Modern, London

Mrs George Augustus Frederick Cavendish Bentinck and her Children

Lightning with Stag in its Glare

Lobster Telephone

Nebuchadnezzar

Related Romanticism Works

Saturn Devouring His Son

Women of Algiers

The Third of May 1808

The Nude Maja

The Dog

The Death of Sardanapalus

The Clothed Maja

The Fighting Temeraire

About Isaac Newton

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