Figure & Form - Present, Past and Personal (Hardcover)

For several decades, New York collectors Melvin Blake and Frank Purnell have dedicated themselves to building an art collection of more than 100 works that spans the ages, beginning with Greek and Roman antiquity but giving major exposure to their own time and circumstance. The scope of the exemplary paintings, sculptures and drawings is wide, ranging from vivid studies of the New York collectors themselves to the magnified, detailed poetic realism of Domenico Gnoli's La Tasca Della Giacca of 1966 and the apparitional 1942 gouache by the Belgian Surrealist Rene Magritte, Les Graces Naturelles. Sam Hunter's text examines many compelling art objects in depth, establishing affinities with the past, raising significant issues that help redefine contemporary realism and relating the work anecdotally to the lives of their creators. Although the two collectors have for the most part limited their expertise to the human figure, they chose among a variety of styles and subjects, mediums and scales in making their vibrant contemporary selection. The result is an unusual continuity of vision and collective connoisseurship in works that are cohesive but never predictable.