Colophon · Image Credits

The Light I Work By

Every image on this site was made by someone else, long before me. Here they are, by name.

Writing is my art. It is the only kind I can make. I have looked at these paintings and drawings for most of my life and never once thought I could do what their makers did — not the hand, not the eye, not the patience. So I have not tried. I have borrowed their light instead, dimmed it down until it sits behind the words without competing with them, and put their names here where they belong.

Great things are not done by impulse, but by a series of small things brought together. Vincent van Gogh, letter to Theo, 22 October 1882

That sentence is the whole argument of this site, written forty years before I was born and by someone who was not talking about philosophy at all. It is also why the borrowing feels honest to me. Nobody makes anything alone. A theory of coherent existence that pretended otherwise would refute itself on the first page — and the plainest evidence for it is that the people below are still doing work in the world, centuries after they set their brushes down.

If I have seen further it is by standing on the shoulders of giants. Isaac Newton, letter to Robert Hooke, 5 February 1675/6 — after Bernard of Chartres, c. 1159

Every work here is in the public domain or released under CC0 by the museum that holds it. Where a collection asks for credit it is given below, and where it does not, it is given anyway. Where an image appears on this site it has been desaturated and tinted to sit inside the palette; the versions below are closer to how they actually look, and the collections linked in each line hold the real thing.

Until seventy, nothing I drew was worthy of notice; at seventy-three I began to grasp how living things grow. Katsushika Hokusai, colophon to One Hundred Views of Mount Fuji, 1834

The works

Leonardo da Vinci, A Deluge — **A Deluge**
Leonardo da Vinci, c. 1517–18Royal Collection Trust · Public domain

Vincent van Gogh, Almond Blossom — **Almond Blossom**
Vincent van Gogh, 1890Van Gogh Museum, Amsterdam · Public domain

Vincent van Gogh, Café Terrace at Night — **Café Terrace at Night**
Vincent van Gogh, 1888Kröller-Müller Museum, Otterlo · Public domain

Andreas Cellarius, Planisphaerium Arateum, from Harmonia Macrocosmica — **Planisphaerium Arateum, from Harmonia Macrocosmica**
Andreas Cellarius, 1660Public domain scan · Public domain

Andreas Cellarius, Coeli Stellati Christiani Haemisphaerium Prius, from Harmonia Macrocosmica — **Coeli Stellati Christiani Haemisphaerium Prius, from Harmonia Macrocosmica**
Andreas Cellarius, 1660Public domain scan · Public domain

Andreas Cellarius, Scenographia Systematis Copernicani, from Harmonia Macrocosmica — **Scenographia Systematis Copernicani, from Harmonia Macrocosmica**
Andreas Cellarius, 1660Public domain scan · Public domain

Andreas Cellarius, Hypothesis Ptolemaica, from Harmonia Macrocosmica — **Hypothesis Ptolemaica, from Harmonia Macrocosmica**
Andreas Cellarius, 1660Public domain scan · Public domain

Andreas Cellarius, Scenographia Systematis Mundani Ptolemaici, from Harmonia Macrocosmica — **Scenographia Systematis Mundani Ptolemaici, from Harmonia Macrocosmica**
Andreas Cellarius, 1660Public domain scan · Public domain

Andreas Cellarius, Planisphaerium Ptolemaicum, from Harmonia Macrocosmica — **Planisphaerium Ptolemaicum, from Harmonia Macrocosmica**
Andreas Cellarius, 1660Public domain scan · Public domain

Andreas Cellarius, Solis circa Orbem Terrarum Spiralis Revolutio, from Harmonia Macrocosmica — **Solis circa Orbem Terrarum Spiralis Revolutio, from Harmonia Macrocosmica**
Andreas Cellarius, 1660Public domain scan · Public domain

Ernst Chladni, Chladni figure 1, from Entdeckungen über die Theorie des Klanges — **Chladni figure 1, from Entdeckungen über die Theorie des Klanges**
Ernst Chladni, 1787Public Domain Review · Public domain

Ernst Chladni, Chladni figure 10, from Entdeckungen über die Theorie des Klanges — **Chladni figure 10, from Entdeckungen über die Theorie des Klanges**
Ernst Chladni, 1787Public Domain Review · Public domain

Ernst Chladni, Chladni figure 2, from Entdeckungen über die Theorie des Klanges — **Chladni figure 2, from Entdeckungen über die Theorie des Klanges**
Ernst Chladni, 1787Public Domain Review · Public domain

Ernst Chladni, Chladni figure 3, from Entdeckungen über die Theorie des Klanges — **Chladni figure 3, from Entdeckungen über die Theorie des Klanges**
Ernst Chladni, 1787Public Domain Review · Public domain

Ernst Chladni, Chladni figure 4, from Entdeckungen über die Theorie des Klanges — **Chladni figure 4, from Entdeckungen über die Theorie des Klanges**
Ernst Chladni, 1787Public Domain Review · Public domain

Ernst Chladni, Chladni figure 5, from Entdeckungen über die Theorie des Klanges — **Chladni figure 5, from Entdeckungen über die Theorie des Klanges**
Ernst Chladni, 1787Public Domain Review · Public domain

Ernst Chladni, Chladni figure 9, from Entdeckungen über die Theorie des Klanges — **Chladni figure 9, from Entdeckungen über die Theorie des Klanges**
Ernst Chladni, 1787Public Domain Review · Public domain

Ernst Chladni, Chladni plate figure — **Chladni plate figure**
Ernst Chladni, 1787Public domain scan · Public domain

H. C. Ørsted, after Chladni, Klangfigurer, Tab. 1 — **Klangfigurer, Tab. 1**
H. C. Ørsted, after Chladni, 1810Public domain scan · Public domain

H. C. Ørsted, after Chladni, Klangfigurer, Tab. 2 — **Klangfigurer, Tab. 2**
H. C. Ørsted, after Chladni, 1810Public domain scan · Public domain

Utagawa Hiroshige, Clematis and Bird — **Clematis and Bird**
Utagawa Hiroshige, Edo periodThe Metropolitan Museum of Art · CC0

Vincent van Gogh, Cypresses — **Cypresses**
Vincent van Gogh, 1889The Metropolitan Museum of Art · CC0

Katsushika Hokusai, Under the Wave off Kanagawa (The Great Wave) — **Under the Wave off Kanagawa (The Great Wave)**
Katsushika Hokusai, c. 1830–32The Metropolitan Museum of Art · CC0

Ancient Egypt, 19th Dynasty, The Weighing of the Heart (detail), Book of the Dead of Hunefer — **The Weighing of the Heart (detail), Book of the Dead of Hunefer**
Ancient Egypt, 19th Dynasty, c. 1275 BCEBritish Museum, London · Public domain

Ancient Egypt, 19th Dynasty, The Weighing of the Heart, Book of the Dead of Hunefer — **The Weighing of the Heart, Book of the Dead of Hunefer**
Ancient Egypt, 19th Dynasty, c. 1275 BCEBritish Museum, London · Public domain

Vincent van Gogh, Irises — **Irises**
Vincent van Gogh, 1889The J. Paul Getty Museum, Los Angeles · CC0

Utagawa Hiroshige, Kawaguchi — **Kawaguchi**
Utagawa Hiroshige, 1857The Metropolitan Museum of Art · CC0

Hilma af Klint, The Ten Largest, No. 2, Childhood — **The Ten Largest, No. 2, Childhood**
Hilma af Klint, 1907Public domain scan · Public domain

Hilma af Klint, The Ten Largest, No. 3, Youth — **The Ten Largest, No. 3, Youth**
Hilma af Klint, 1907Public domain scan · Public domain

Hilma af Klint, The Ten Largest, No. 4, Youth — **The Ten Largest, No. 4, Youth**
Hilma af Klint, 1907Public domain scan · Public domain

Hilma af Klint, The Ten Largest, No. 5, Adulthood — **The Ten Largest, No. 5, Adulthood**
Hilma af Klint, 1907Public domain scan · Public domain

Hilma af Klint, The Ten Largest, No. 6, Adulthood — **The Ten Largest, No. 6, Adulthood**
Hilma af Klint, 1907Public domain scan · Public domain

Hilma af Klint, The Ten Largest, No. 7, Adulthood — **The Ten Largest, No. 7, Adulthood**
Hilma af Klint, 1907Public domain scan · Public domain

Hilma af Klint, The Ten Largest, No. 9, Old Age — **The Ten Largest, No. 9, Old Age**
Hilma af Klint, 1907Public domain scan · Public domain

Leonardo da Vinci, Lady with an Ermine — **Lady with an Ermine**
Leonardo da Vinci, c. 1489–91Czartoryski Museum, Kraków · Public domain

Leonardo da Vinci, On the Eye and Vision — **On the Eye and Vision**
Leonardo da Vinci, c. 1490–1510Wellcome Collection · Public domain

Leonardo da Vinci, Mona Lisa — **Mona Lisa**
Leonardo da Vinci, c. 1503–16Musée du Louvre, Paris · Public domain

Isaac Newton, Colour circle, from Opticks — **Colour circle, from Opticks**
Isaac Newton, 1704Public domain scan · Public domain

Utagawa Hiroshige, Ochanomizu — **Ochanomizu**
Utagawa Hiroshige, Edo periodThe Metropolitan Museum of Art · CC0

Vincent van Gogh, Oleanders — **Oleanders**
Vincent van Gogh, 1888The Metropolitan Museum of Art · CC0

Vincent van Gogh, Roses — **Roses**
Vincent van Gogh, 1890The Metropolitan Museum of Art · CC0

Vincent van Gogh, The Starry Night — **The Starry Night**
Vincent van Gogh, 1889Museum of Modern Art, New York · Public domain

Vincent van Gogh, Starry Night Over the Rhône — **Starry Night Over the Rhône**
Vincent van Gogh, 1888Musée d'Orsay, Paris · Public domain

Leonardo da Vinci, Studies of Water — **Studies of Water**
Leonardo da Vinci, c. 1510–12Royal Collection Trust · Public domain

Leonardo da Vinci, Vitruvian Man — **Vitruvian Man**
Leonardo da Vinci, c. 1490Gallerie dell'Accademia, Venice · Public domain

Leonardo da Vinci, Studies of Water, and a Seated Old Man — **Studies of Water, and a Seated Old Man**
Leonardo da Vinci, c. 1508–9Royal Collection Trust · Public domain

Ancient Egypt, Wedjat (Eye of Horus) amulet — **Wedjat (Eye of Horus) amulet**
Ancient Egypt, Late PeriodThe Metropolitan Museum of Art · CC0

Vincent van Gogh, Wheat Field with Cypresses — **Wheat Field with Cypresses**
Vincent van Gogh, 1889The Metropolitan Museum of Art · CC0

Thomas Young, Sketch of two-source wave interference — **Sketch of two-source wave interference**
Thomas Young, 1803Bakerian Lecture, Royal Society · Public domain

49 works, drawn from the open-access programmes of The Metropolitan Museum of Art, the J. Paul Getty Museum, the Van Gogh Museum, the British Museum, the Royal Collection, the Wellcome Collection, and Wikimedia Commons. All are public domain or CC0. No work still in copyright appears anywhere on this site.