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Peter Milton
Interiors I: Family Reunion — A penetrating scene with a hidden homage to Eadwea

1984

$9,500
£7,295.59
€8,360.66
CA$13,373.65
A$14,981.45
CHF 7,792.21
MX$182,742.74
NOK 99,205.25
SEK 93,543.48
DKK 62,401.66

About the Item

Interiors I: Family Reunion 1984 Resist ground etching and engraving on BFK Rives wove paper, 20 x 36 inches (501 x 913 mm), full margins. Signed, titled, dated and numbered 49/175 in pencil, lower margin. In excellent condition with minor mat tone. A luminous, rich, and well-inked impression of this haunting image, with astonishing detail and depth. Framed handsomely under museum grade glass with archival materials in a solid wood frame with silver finish. [Milton 107] Intended to be a stand alone image in its inception, Family Reunion ended up spawning seven additional images, and became a sort of Primo Pensiero in the sprawling, masterpiece suite now known as Interiors. The suite took eight years to complete, and consists of works of varying format, psychological intensity, and subject matter. The thematic darkness in the eight images waxes and wanes, and Milton intentionally included several interlude works to lighten the tension he felt while composing several of the darker images. The first two in the series, Family Reunion, and Hotel Paradise Café, were meant to be companion pieces. The equilibrium of each composition is anchored on a central brooding figure; a man (perhaps based on a Thomas Eakins portrait of the American anthropologist Frank Hamilton Cushing), and a woman, respectively, each of whom engage in direct eye contact with the viewer. Often dark in theme, the images in the series are rife with portraiture, including a small image of Eadweard Muybridge's 1885 photograph, "Paralytic child walking on all fours," which can be seen hanging on the wall in the far background behind the central figure in Family Reunion. The series also includes several portraits of the artist himself at various stages in his life. Milton expresses in his notes regarding the series that one such portrait is meant to represent a microcosm of the world, "grand, filled with distractions and histories, sinking."
  • Creator:
    Peter Milton (1930, American)
  • Creation Year:
    1984
  • Dimensions:
    Height: 20 in (50.8 cm)Width: 36 in (91.44 cm)
  • Medium:
  • Movement & Style:
  • Period:
  • Condition:
    Framed under museum grade glass with archival materials in a solid wood frame with silver finish.
  • Gallery Location:
    Middletown, NY
  • Reference Number:
    Seller: BH4741stDibs: LU1979210341252

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Resist ground etching and engraving on Rives heavyweight buff paper, 20 x 36 inches (508 x 914 mm), full margins. Signed, titled, dated and numbered 103/160 in pencil, lower margin. Minor mat tone. A rich and finely printed impression of this complex and iconic work by Milton. Framed handsomely under Plexiglas with archival materials in a solid wood frame with silver finish. [Milton 98]. Milton states that in the evolution of his body of graphic work he found himself at point that necessitated the exertion of nerve in his subject matter. He found it imperative for growth to explore whether his compositions had previously been too polite, and through this process he experienced a great burst of artistic and psychic liberation. Milton refers to this awakening as a sort of adolescence, which he felt demanded a natural examination of mysteries of sexual awakening. Les Belles et La Bête...
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Interiors VII: The Train from Munich
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Located in Middletown, NY
Interiors VII: The Train from Munich Robert E. Townsend, 1991. Resist ground etching and engraving with hand refinement in charcoal, pencil, stabilo, and eraser on BFK Rives white wove paper, 20 x 36 inches (507 x 914 mm), full margins. Signed, titled, dated and numbered 51/175 by the artist in pencil, lower margin. A brilliant, inky impression with luminous light and gradient tones. In excellent condition with one extremely minor and superficial spot of light tan adhesive residue on the verso, unobtrusive and not visible on the recto, with no other visible defects. With the blind stamp of the printer, Robert E. Townsend in the lower left margin. An especially fine impression in superb condition. [Milton 113]. When asked about this work in particular, Milton expressed that his favorite images were his darkest images, in theme, mood, and in ink. Milton, who has said that his work is infused with a postmodern awareness of the past, has focused here in a deeply personal way on a segment of history that continues to haunt us all. The work, published in 1991, evokes one of the darkest periods of European history, the eroding and erasing of European culture under fascism, and the eventual total loss of humanity. The Train from Munich is an especially relevant and emotional work for Milton, who created the piece for his wife, Edith, who escaped Munich in 1939 as a child on the fabled Kinderstransport. The Kinderstransport was a desperate rescue effort on the part of the British government to save as many Jewish children as possible by railway before borders closed on the precipice of the Second World War. Children left their parents behind, and boarded the trains alone, leaving the impending doom of Nazi Germany, they arrived in Great Britain as refugees. More than 10,000 children escaped the holocaust via the Kinderstransport. In Train from Munich, the image itself holds an almost immeasurable amount of symbolism; each inch of the matrix is a successful effort to confront this history in a way that is poignant through a series of motifs. We see the Café disappearing into a ghostlike memory of the past, an allegory to the disintegration of culture, while through the windows we can see a rampant, snarling dog; a portrait of Hitler's shepherd, Blondi. Blondi isn't the only notable figure in the composition. Milton has pointed out that the fading figure of the doorman at the Hotel Metropole is modeled after the artist and intellectual Marcel Duchamp, and the face of the young girl peering...
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Les Belles et la Bête: Before the Hunt
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Resist ground etching and engraving on cream wove paper, 22 x 39 inches (558 x 990 mm), full margins. Signed, titled, dated, and numbered 27/160 in pencil, lower margin. With the blindstamp of the printer, Robert E. Townsend, in the lower left margin. A beautiful, richly inked impression of this highly detailed, large image. In very good condition with minor mat tone, extremely minor scattered light surface soiling, and one pin-point sized dot of brown discoloration on the lower left margin, recto, well outside of image area. [Milton 99]. Milton states that there is a metaphorical evolution at the root of his body of graphic work, and with Les Belles et la Bête, Before the Hunt, he found himself at a crossroads that he viewed as a sort of artistic adolescence, which he felt demanded a natural examination of mysteries of sexual awakening. The image is brimming with fantastical images and metaphors for the confrontation of sexual exploration; a Freudian analyst appears in the left of the image, scattered tableaus of paired figures...
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Mornings with Judd (Second state)
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Lift ground and hard ground etching and engraving on Murillo white wove paper, 18 x 24 inches (455 x 608 mm), full margins. Signed, dated, titled and numbered 60/100 in pencil, lower margin. Printed and published by the artist. In very good condition with minor age tone and scattered light surface soiling on the verso. Framed handsomely in an original Kulicke welded aluminum frame with the embossed maker's mark. [Milton 61]. Milton revisited this image in 1974 during an experiment to explore collage and the process of contact printing a high resolution photo-transparency directly onto a copper plate. He printed a small detail transparency of Mornings with Judd onto the existing plate, alongside it's larger self, and broke through to a new photo-resist approach, which Milton described as "piquant and irresistible," in his essays appearing in Robert Flynn...
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