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Exhibition Preparation Sheets

12 altars

Archives

Author

Author André Breton
People cited Francis Bouvet, Gabrielle Buffet-Picabia, Frédéric Delanglade, George Du Maurier, Marcelle Ferry, Henri Goetz, Jindřich Heisler, R. Hertz, Pierre Janet, Wifredo Lam, Isidore Ducasse, dit comte de Lautréamont, Georg-Christoph Lichtenberg, Jules Monnerot, Arthur Rimbaud, Jeanne Sabrenas, Henri et No Seigle, Maurice Baskine, Victor Brauner, André Breton, Marcel Duchamp, Jacques Hérold, Alfred Jarry, Marcel Jean, Roberto Echauren Matta, Arpad Mezei, Benjamin Péret, Raymond Queneau, Raymond Roussel, Claude Tarnaud, Marie Cerminova, dite Toyen

Description

Cardboard folder compiled by André Breton in preparation for the exhibition Le Surréalisme en 1947.

The highlight of the International Surrealist Exhibition held at the Maeght Gallery in July 1947 was the twelve altars "devoted to a being, a category of beings, or an object likely to be endowed with mythical life". The sheets collected here by Breton allow us to better understand the collective dimension of this work, in which the artists and poets of the group collaborated. Thus, the altar to Léonie Aubois d'Ashby, placed under the sign of Rimbaud, was made by Breton with the help of Francis Bouvet, Michel Hertz, and Claude Tarnaud, with offerings from Claude Tarnaud (an object-painting), Jacques Hérold (a tie!), Victor Brauner (a root), and delicacies provided by Benjamin Péret and Francis Bouvet. Each sheet also mentions a network of correspondences, particularly astrological ones. [Atelier André Breton website, 2005] 

André Breton's cardboard folder​
- “Altars", 12 in-12 pages in ink by Breton about altars made by Delanglade, Lam, Serpan, Heisler, Breton, Brauner, Matta, Seigle, Herold and Toyen for the 1947 exhibition. Each altar has an extract from a text. Breton has copied in ink the twelve texts chosen as well as the names of the artists who made the altars.
- 1) The Society Tiger (Jean Ferry) 
- 2) The hair of Falmer (Lautréamont) 
- 3) The suspicious Heloderma on the barrel cactus 
- 4) Jeanne Sabrenas (Alfred Jarry)
- 5) Leonie Aubois d'Ashby (Arthur Rimbaud)
- 6) The Secretary Bird 
- 7) The Juggler of Gravity
- 8) The Star-Nosed Mole (La Faille, cited by Buffon)
- 9) The Wolf-Table
- 10) Raymond Roussel
- 11) The Great Invisibles (André Breton)
- 12) The Window of Magna Sed Apta (George du Maurier)
The thirteenth altar, by Baskine, announced in the catalogue is not included here. [Sale Catalogue, 2003].

Exhibition place