"Untitled (Nude with Crossed Arms)." Circa 1982. Graphite on paper. Signed on the bottom right.

24 x 18".

Notes:

Born in Vermont, Stephen Hale studied at the Rhode Island School of Design (RISD) in the late 1970s under the mentorship of painter and illustrator Richard Merkin. He graduated in 1982 and soon moved to New York, taking up residence in the East Village, where he became part of the vibrant downtown art scene.

Hale also worked as a commercial illustrator and he produced work for publications such as The New Yorker, Variety and Detour magazines, as well as film and theatre poster illustrations. Alongside his commercial career, he developed a personal body of work centered on photorealistic graphite drawings of his close friends beginning in the 1980s and this work would appear to be from that period.

Hale became known for his meticulous rendering of the male body where the likeness of his drawn figures is barely discernible from a photograph. Rather than working from a single reference point, Hale typically photographed his subjects repeatedly and then assembled a composite figure, selecting different features from multiple images. The resulting compositions combine varied poses and perspectives, producing figures that appear hyperreal yet psychologically engaged.

Beyond the studio, Hale documented New York’s underground gay nightlife. He captured clubgoers in intimate and candid moments in his drawings of go-go boys, strippers, leatherfolk, and scantily clad men in jockstraps.

Hale’s works are held in major institutional collections including the RISD Museum, the Carnegie Museum of Art, the Arkansas Museum of Fine Art, and the National Arts Club in New York.

Some staining along edges of the work.

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