Peter Blume (American, born Russia (now Belarus), 1906-1992): The Rock. This item is a vintage collotype art print of Peter Blume's painting of "The Rock." The print was published by Artistic Picture Publishing Co. NY, printed by Joh Enschede.

When it was exhibited at the Carnegie International in Pittsburgh in 1950, The Rock was voted the show's most popular painting. Peter Blume's dramatic image of a shattered but enduring rock must have struck a responsive chord with many post–World War II viewers. Displaying a startling juxtaposition of images, the work evokes Surrealist dreamscapes made even more vivid by meticulous brushwork inspired by fifteenth- and sixteenth-century northern European painting. Although Blume's imagery resists easy interpretation, the work suggests a parable of destruction and reconstruction. The jagged rock looms at the center of the composition, still upright despite the removal of its base by workers below. On the right, smoke billows around the charred timbers of a house, an image that might allude to the bombing of London during World War II. On the left, a new building, encased in scaffolding, rises as laborers in the foreground cart slabs of stone toward it.

22 x 27 inches with margins.

Private collection, Boston.

The print is not faded or stained, and does not appear to have ever been framed or matted, it was stored rolled in a tube. The margins are somewhat tattered with light folds and creases.

NOTE: If documentation is not listed, the lot is sold without documents.

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