Institute for Advanced Technology in the Humanities (University of Virginia)

The William Blake Archive Project was proposed in 1993 by the Institute for Advanced Technology in the Humanities (IATH), a humanities computing research center located at the University of Virginia, Charlottesville, as an experiment in hypermedia scholarly communication. A collaboration was formed between the IATH, directed by John Unsworth, and three noted Blake experts, the latter of whom also serve as the editors of the William Blake Archive Web site: Morris Eaves, University of Rochester; Robert Essick, University of California, Riverside; and Joseph Viscomi, University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill.

The William Blake Archive Project, as a pioneer in the area of electronic scholarship, represents one of the earliest and most influential examples of electronic scholarship, establishing standards for electronic editing, site construction, and digital reproduction, serving as the model for subsequent projects.

The William Blake Archive Project Web site ( http://www.blakearchive.org ) was first launched in 1996 and is located and maintained at the IATH. The Project Web site unifies access to the dispersed prints, paintings and poems of William Blake (1757-1827). A growing number of contributors to the Web site’s visual and literary contents include originals borrowed from American and British institutions, as well as a major private collector, who have given the William Blake Archive the permission to use thousands of Blake’s images and texts free of charge. Most of the original Blake texts and images are otherwise difficult to view because of their obscure location or fragile condition.

Project participants met annually at “Blake Camp.” All other project-related communication of this intensive scholarly collaboration was conducted via email.

The William Blake Archive Project has been sponsored by the Library of Congress and supported by a variety of institutions including the Getty Grant Program, Essick Foundation, National Endowment for the Humanities (Preservation and Access Grant), Paul Mellon Centre for the Study of British Art, University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill, Sun Microsystems and Inso Corporation.

Project participants consisted of Director John Unsworth, University of Virginia; Editors Morris Eaves, University of Rochester; Robert Essick, University of California, Riverside; and Joseph Viscomi, University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill; Technical Editors Matthew Kirschenbaum, University of Maryland, College Park; and Andrea Laue, University of Virginia; and Project Manager Andrea Dickens, University of Virginia. An advisory board is composed of thirteen scholars from various American academic institutions such as Columbia University, Loyola University, University of California, University of Virginia, as well as British institutions such as University College London, the British Museum, London and the Fitzwilliam Museum in Cambridge.

From the guide to the The William Blake Archive Project records, 1995-2002, (University of Minnesota Libraries. Charles Babbage Institute. [cbi])