Sky and Water by Gabor Peterdi
This is a dramatic aquatint etching with embossing by noted American printmaker Gabor Peterdi. It is not titled, but the image, while abstract seems to be a cross-section of the ocean with waves, a gray sky above, and backlit blue cloud-like structures. In the 1960s Peterdi was experimenting with these cross sectional images with intricate structures etched into an aquatint ground. This piece is unusual in that it also includes embossing of the paper to created surface texture--an interesting approach to add a third dimension to a print, which is usually two dimensional. At the bottom of the image is a blue rectangle with etched structure surrounding a bright green rectangle that is perfectly smooth. This rectangle and the two blue clouds create a strong triangle in the center of the image. A very dramatic piece that shows Peterdi at his finest. The piece is signed and dated in pencil lower right, Peterdi '65 Imp (short for impression). The edition is given in pencil lower left 30 - 100. The plate mark is 24 x 19 inches. It is printed on a full, untrimmed sheet that is 30 x 22 inches. It is in excellent condition, well-struck and inked with great embossing. There are no tears, paper loss, stains, foxing, toning or other issues. It is unframed. One of the best works out of the thirty or forty I've handled by this artist (others are available in the inventory).
Gabor Peterdi 1915-2001
Gabor Peterdi was born in Hungary. He began the study of art at age 14 at the Hungarian Academy. After just a couple of years he was able to study at the Academia delle Belle Arti on scholarship. He also studied in Paris at both the Academie Julian and the Academie Scandinavien. His steep ascendency in the art world continued when he joined the prestigious Atelier 17 (Paris) in 1933 at age 18. Under the tutelage of the great artist and teacher William Stanley Hayter, he learned etching and engraving. Printmaking became his preferred outlet and he became recognized as one of the pre-eminent print artists of the post-WWII era.
His talent was recognized almost immediately as he had his first exhibit when he as 15 at the Ernst Museum in Budapest. That same year he won the Prix de Rome scholarship leading to his time at the Academia delle Belle Arti. Following his arrival in the United States in 1939, he had a solo exhibit of paintings at the Julien Levy Gallery in New York. Following WWII (where he served in the US military in Germany as a naturalized citizen of the United States) he joined the Atelier 17 in New York and focused on print making. He preferred intaglio prints and throughout his career explored new techniques that expanded the approach to intaglio printmaking. His work shows the influence of Hayter, although he well beyond the geometric abstractions favored by his mentor. Still, his work retains its abstract expressionist origins.
He became an influential teacher of printmaking joining the faculty of the Brooklyn Museum in 1948 and subsequently teaching at Hunter College, and Yale where he finished his career. He authored a very influential book on the art of printmaking, Printmaking Methods Old and New.
His work is held in many major collections, most notably the National Gallery of Art (that has more than 20 of his prints), the Metropolitan Museum of Art, the Museum of Modern Art (New York the Art Institute of Chicago, the Museum of Fine Arts Boston, and the Philadelphia Museum of Art.
Price: $525
Size: 30 x 22 inches
Plate Size: 24 x 19 inches
Condition: Pristine
Medium: Aquatint Etching
Subject: Abstract
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