Innocence long gone

Art Experts Protest Sale of Rare Set of Blakes

The Times: The discovery was pure serendipity: nosing around in a dusty bookshop in Scotland on a spring day five years ago, a pair of British booksellers stumbled upon a weathered red leather case engraved with the words "Designs for Blair's Grave." Opening it, they found 19 Romantic yet macabre watercolors — depicting angels, sarcophagi, moonlit graveyards, arm-linked spirits — rendered in a subtle range of grays, black and pastels.

Five years, one lawsuit and an export battle later, the watercolors — illustrations created in 1805 by the poet and artist William Blake for a 1743 poem — are being heralded by scholars as the most important Blake discovery in a century.

Yet to the consternation of many experts, all 19 are headed for auction this spring at Sotheby's in New York, which plans to break up the set and sell them on May 2 for a projected $12 million to $17.5 million. Estimated prices of the watercolors, each mounted on a 13-by-10-inch backing, range from $180,000 to $260,000 for the inscribed title page to $1 million to $1.5 million for the most intricate and compelling scenes.

That the works may end up scattered is a bitter prospect for Tate Britain, one of the world's most important repositories of Blake's works. Aided by a temporary export ban, the museum tried but failed to raise the money to buy them.

How the mighty have fallen. Blake is an integral part of the Brittanica that once ruled the seas and a huge overseas empire. How sad is it that today, the Brits can't find $20 million to rescue a national treasure?

J.K. Rowling? Paul McCartney? Elton John? David Beckham? Anyone wanna step in and do something for God, queen and country?

Sotheby's photos of the discovered Blakes via the New York Times.