The source of Paolozzi’s Newton after Blake is the 1795 colour print of Isaac Newton by William Blake, in the collection of Tate, which shows the naked seated figure of Newton under the ocean, measuring the universe with a pair of dividers. Paolozzi developed this idea in 1987 concurrently with a commission he received from the National Portrait Gallery to make a portrait sculpture of the Italian-British architect Richard Rogers.

Paolozzi made a William Blake crouching figure with a head of Richard Rogers, as well as a second figure with an anonymous head. The anonymous figure was cast in bronze in an edition of three; two casts were given a dark brown patina while the third has a golden patina. Two of the Newtons are seated on a solid geometrical stool while the third, this one, has a stool that has open spaces. When the British Library building was underway, the architect Colin St John Wilson was wondering what he could put as a focus for the Library’s courtyard. Visiting Paolozzi in his Chelsea studio, Wilson was thrilled to see the golden version of the crouching figure, and he proposed to the Library committee that Paolozzi should create a huge figure of Newton. The idea was approved and the twelve foot high figure of Newton was unveiled in the courtyard in 1995.

Cecil Elsom, C.B.E (1912-2006) started his first architectural practice in 1933, when he was just qualified. In 1947 he founded the London-based architectural practice EPR Architects with William Pack and Alan Roberts. According to Elsom’s obituary in The Times, ‘he was an architect who appreciated classical design and restoration but also provided London with admirable postwar buildings’ (The Times, 27 April 2006). Elsom, was great friends with Paolozzi, having first met him when he asked the artist to design the wallpaper for a project at Kent House, London. Elsom put together a significant collection of works by Paolozzi and commissioned several works directly from him.