Peter Blum Edition:
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 | |
| Processed by: | Helen Young, 2002 |
| Repository: |
Organizational History
| 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). | ||