Just released is Chase the Devil, a new album by Gary Lucas and Dean Bowman, which draws inspiration from Blake, Blind Willie Johnson and Shlomo Carlebach among others. Lucas, who played and recorded with a number of artists including Captain Beefheart, Jeff Buckley and Lou Reed over the years, has been attracting reviews that describe his guitar-playing as driven by an almost religious fervour on tracks such as "In Christ There Is No East or West" and "Out on the Rolling Sea". Of particular note for Blake followers is the inclusion of a version of "Jerusalem" that combines Lucas's bluesy, sliding guitar to good effect with Bowman's clear voice.
An exhibition around Carl Jung's "Red Book" at the Library of Congress shows how Blake was one of his influences. The 205-page manuscript had been locked away after his death until a facsimile was published by Norton last year, and demonstrates his technique of what he calls "active imagination", elaborating the stream of his unconscious. Prints of Blake, alongside Tibetan mandalas and books of alchemy, are part of the exhibition that will run from June 17 till August 18. Another exhibition, "Psychedelic: Optical and Visionary Art since the 1960s" at the San Antonio Museum of Arts, draws on Blake and Hieronymous Bosch as precursors, and runs till August 1.
Of forthcoming talks, lectures and conferences, Victoria University is holding a Symposium, "Blake In Our Time", celebrating the life and work of renowned Blake scholar, G. E. Bentley, Jr., on August 28. On July 15-16, "Blake, Gender and Sexuality in the Twenty-First Century", organised by Helen Bruder and Tristanne Connolly, will be running at the Christopher Room, Aldgate Church, Oxford, and the "Digital Romanticisms" conference at the University of Tokyo on May 22-23 will include a number of speakers discussing Blake's work in the digital age.
Finally, The Blake Society also recently posted a reminder that it will be running its annual celebration of Blake's life and work at his grave in Bunhill Fields. Anyone can come and participate, and this year Robin Hatton-Gore, the gardener in charge of the cemetary for many years, will talk about the topography of the site. The event takes place at noon on Sunday, August 15.