An Inventory of Its Collection in the Art Collection at the Harry Ransom
Center
Creator:
Peter Blum Edition
Title:
Peter Blum Edition Art Collection
Dates:
1981-1987
Extent:
12 portfolios, 1 folder (123 items, 96 prints)
Abstract:
The Peter Blum Edition Art Collection
includes twelve of their art editions and one separately published print. Fourteen
different artists are represented: Americans John Baldessari, Jonathan Borofsky,
Eric Fischl, and James Turrell; Italians Sandro Chia, Francesco Clemente, and
Enzo
Cucchi; Swiss Martin Disler, Anselm Stalder, and Rolf Winnewisser; German A. R.
Penck; and the Canadian collaborative group, General Idea (A. A. Bronson, Felix
Partz, and Jorge Zontal).
Call Number:
Art Collection AR-00203
Language:
English, French, German,
and Italian
Access:
Open for research. A minimum of twenty-four hours is required to pull art materials
to the Reading Room.
Administrative Information
Acquisition:
Purchases (R10356, R10557, R11379), 1983-1987, and Gift (G2200), 1985
In 1980 Peter Blum began to publish graphic art editions under the name Peter Blum
Edition. Blum, who grew up in Holland and studied political science in Paris and
at
Georgetown University, Washington, had an interest in art from an early age.
In 1970 he took a summer job at Galerie Beyeler in Basel, where he found himself
attracted to fine prints, books and printing, and ended up working there until
1976.
From 1978 to 1980 he worked in Zurich at the Internationale Neue Kunsthalle, where
he documented artists' installations. Through this job he met A. R. Penck, John
Baldessari, and Jonathan Borofsky. In 1979 he visited the Galleria De Crescenzo
in
Rome, where he was introduced to the drawings of Enzo Cucchi, Francesco Clemente,
Sandro Chia, and Mimmo Paladino. He drove back to Switzerland the next day and
was
struck with the idea of publishing.
His first collaboration was with Cucchi in Rome. He continued to commission important
artists with whom he wanted to collaborate, often choosing artists who had little
or
no experience with printmaking. Blum would obtain each artist's proposal, or
sometimes offer his own ideas, and then select the printer's studio that would
be
most suitable to the artist and himself. The design and construction of the
portfolio box was given the same importance as the prints themselves, sometimes
with
the artist's involvement.
Sources:
Katz, Vincent. "Interview with Peter Blum."The Print Collector's Newsletter 21, no. 4
(September-October 1990) 136-140.
Scope and Contents
The Peter Blum Edition Art Collection includes twelve of their art editions and one
separately published print. Fourteen different artists are represented: Americans
John Baldessari, Jonathan Borofsky, Eric Fischl, and James Turrell; Italians Sandro
Chia, Francesco Clemente, and Enzo Cucchi; Swiss Martin Disler, Anselm Stalder,
and
Rolf Winnewisser; German A. R. Penck; and the Canadian collaborative group, General
Idea (A. A. Bronson, Felix Partz, and Jorge Zontal).
The portfolios are listed in alphabetical order by artist.
The portfolios of John Baldessari, Jonathan Borofsky, Sandro Chia, Francesco
Clemente, Enzo Cucchi, Martin Disler, Eric Fischl, A.R. Penck, and Rolf Winnewisser
are described in detail in Bice Curiger’s Looks et
Tenebrae, 1984.
Related Material
The Ransom Center has additional works published by Peter Blum Edition in the
Library: Enzo Cucchi's Sparire= Entschwinden=
Disappearing (1987); Enzo Cucchi's Sparire
(1987); Alex and Vincent Katz's A Tremor in the
Morning, with original woodcuts (1986); Arthur Miller's Homely Girl, with 10 original etchings by Louise
Bourgeois (1992); James Turrell's Mapping Spaces
(1987); Kenneth Rexroth's translation of poems by Fu Du, Thirty-six Poems, with an original etching by Brice Marden (1987); Bice
Curiger's Looks et Tenebrae (1984).
