PARİS P O S T W A R

A R T A N D E X I S T E N T I A L I S M 1945-55

-CA.
y THE İNDEPENDENT D S İ S S k

Sponsored by The Independent

Supported by A F A A , Association Française d'Action Arlistique.
Ministere des Affaires Etrangeres. The Cultural Service of the French
Embassy. London
VVith assistance fronı Visiting Arts

Cover:
Germaine Richicr Diabolo 1950(110.99)

Frontispiece:
BrassaV Graffîti 1950
Mıısee National d'Art Modeme.
Cemre Georges Pompidoıı. Paris.
Donation Daniel Cordier 1 989
{£) Gilberic Brassaî

ıs» x i 8 54 *7 x

Published by order of the Trustees 19 93

for tlıe exhlbition at the Tatc Gallery 9 june - 5 Septcnıber 19 93
Published by Tate Gallery Publications, Millbank. London sw ip 4RG
Dcsigned by Caroline Jobnston
e -Tate Gallery and contributors 19 9 3 Ali rights reserved
Typesct by August Filmsetting. St Helens
Printed in Great Britain by Balding + Mansell plc. VVisbech. Cambridğeshire
 CONTENTS

7 Forevvord

8 Acknovvledgments

9 Sponsors* Prefaces

12 Presentation

15 Introduction
FRANCES MORRIS

25 Paris Post War: In Search of the Absolute

S A R A H WILSON

53 Existentialism and Post-War British Art

D A V11) M E L L O R

63 The Artists f r a n c i -s m o r r i s

Antoniıı Artaud 6 5; Jean Dubuffet 79; Jean Fautrier 89;

Alberto Giacometti 10 5 : Francis Gruber 12 9 ;
Jean Helion 1 3 5 ; Henri M ichaux 1 4 3 ; Pablo Picasso 1 5 5 :
Gcrmaine Richier 1 6 1 ; Bram van Veldc 1 7 1 ; Wols 18 i

205 The VVriters

VINCENT GILLE

2 13 Chronoiogy
VINCENT GILLE

223 List of VVorks and Documentation

F R A N C E S MORRI S

PARİS P O S T WAR
A R T A N D E X I S T E N T I A L I S M 1945-55

TATE GALLERY
P A R İ S P O S T WAR:
I N S E A R C H OF T H E A B S O L U T E
Sarah VVİlson
I Introduction to Existentialisms
Auschvvitz - schvvitz - schvvitz
Ausclı\vitz - schvvitz - schvvitz
Buchenvvald!
Bouhn wald!
AD O N O O O I A D O N O l!
Isidorc Isou. 1 9 4 7 '
The Europe of bonıbed ghost towııs is no more ravaged than the
idea Europe has made for itseli of man.
Andre Malraux. 1 9 4 7 2
Paris post vvar w as a city vvhich embraced existentialism as a phil-
osophy and as a w ay of life. But ‘existentialisnT \vas a portmanteau-
\vord which teemed \vith ambiguities. A vvord vvhich became a sign
for nihilism and the extreme. it vvas dialectically related to the
retrieval of tradition, the spirit of rcconstruction and indeed the
pursuit of happiness. in a city vvhosc nerve-centre became Saint-
Germain-des-Pr£s.
In April 19 4 5 . eiglıt months after the Liberation euphoria in
Paris, the First nevvsreels and photographs of the concentratioıı
camps reached France. proof of a policy of iııdustrialised genocide.
Kmaciated deportees arriving at the Gare Samt-hazare soon offered
their eye-vvitııess accounts. hı August 19 4 5 . atomic bombs vvere
dropped on Hiroslıima and Nagasaki cnding the global vvar. They
vvere the ultimate demonstration of the ’revenge of technology’ as
predicted by VValter Benjamin; and the ultimate refutation of the
claims of Westerıı lıumanism to a tradition of enlighteııment and
progress.* Existentialism. a many-branched philosophy vvhich
emphasised crises of beiııg. persoııal actioıı and commitment - in its
most intellcctualised or most popular forıııs - offered coordiııates for
decision vvhich could be brought to bear upon individual choices at
a moment vvhose unbearable intensity seemed to announce the end
of history itself.
Yet nevv philosophies for reconstruction in 19 4 5 vvere chal-
lenged by the atrocities committed in the name of the epuraiion: the
purging of institutions or individuals deemed to lıavc collaborated
vvith the Nazis. The crux of political debate focused upon the notion
of legitimacy. vvhich in turn governed policies ofcontinuity versus
those of caesura. of the radical break. The psychology of the post-
w ar period. deeply bound up in the simultaneous desire for botlı
caesura. contiııuity and catharsis. vvas reflected in contemporary
art and thought. Debates around existentialism extended into ali
domains. in particular religioıı and politics. The key vvord ‘lıuma-
nisnT became an indicator. Sartre. vvhose Being and Nothinıjncss had
appeared in 19 4 3 . posited lıumanism vvithin existentia!ism. tvvo
ycars later. as being 'preseııt tlırough absence'. a contcntion central
to the vvhole existentialist/humanist controvcrsy.
The debate on lıumanism in post-vvar France vvas complex. İt
ıııirrored the political tripartism of the coalitioıı govemm ents of the
Fourth Republic vvith a ’plıilosoplıical tripartism': existentialism.
Marxism and Catholic personalism. each of vvhich claimed huınaıı-
ism as their ovvn. Ali three movements lıeld dissident positions in
the 1930S. vvhich had matured in clandestinity duriııg tlıc Occupa-
tion.4 Sartre gave his lecture *ls Existeııtialism a Hunıanism?’ in
October 19 4 5 . as a riposte to attacks on ali sides: the Communists
had attacked the emplıasis on the sordid. the quietism of ’despair'.
and the lack of solidarity vvith the rest of mankind implicd by the
existentialist position: the Catholics attacked Sartre’s 'freedom* for
its nihilism and irresponsibility. its denial of the reality and serious-
ııess of hutııan affairs. Sartre himself. at tlıc beginııiııg of his lecture
acknovvledged the two strands of the movement: the Christian
strand (originating in Kierkegaard's attack on Hegel) via jaspers
and Gabriel Marcel. and that of cxistential atiıeism via Heidegger.5
As far as Catholicism vvas concemed. France vvas of course lıis-
torically split. to sonıe extent along class lines. into a ııation of
believers and uııbelievers: the lay educatioıı of the vvorking classes
coincided vvith the proclaimed atiıeism of the Coııımunist Party. but
tradition and church ritual lingered. The Catholic church. vvhich
had been passive if not dovvnriglıt collaborative during the Occupa-
tion. actively souglıt nevv recruits: Catholic personalism attempted
to engagc in dialogue both vvith Sartre and the Marxists: the Coııı-
munist ‘extended lıand' policy likevvise souglıt to poach the Catho­
lic vote. Catholic ‘personalist’ argum eııts vvere exemplifıed by the
vvritings of Emmaııuel Mounicr and his revievv Esprit. VVhile taking
011 tlıe Marxists. Mounier constaııtly challenged Sartre and the pos­
ition of Les Temps Modernes, vvhile his Introdııclion to Existentialisms
(19 4 6 ). claimed priority for the Christian existentialist position/’
The conservatism of the Catholic church vvas matched by that of
the Coııımunist Party. vvhich enjoined a similarly ascetic discipliııe
and sexual conformism. Sartre’s particular braııd of cxistcııtialism
had the philosophical and intellectual credentials to compete vvith
these tvvo systems: his emplıasis 011 ‘engagement* iıııplied a commit­
ment as demanding as his rivals. But Sartre fiouted the precepts of
the Catholic and Coııımunist establishments in tvvo vvays: he exem-
plified tınconıpromising atiıeism and a certain sexual freedom - at
least a vvorking redefinition of the couple - in a vvay vvhich vvas
exhilarating for a younger. post-vvar generation. Moreover. the
‘existential' predicaments dramatised by Sartre in a series of suc-
cessful novels and plays involved real choices in the real vvorld -
vvith ali the absurdity of contingent life. Thus he vvas perceived as
a threat to an older generation vvlıo savv vvhat Sartre’s ‘freedom’
nıight iıııply in terms of irrevocable social and structural clıaııges in
society. Novvlıere vvas this more traıısparent than in Existentialisnı.
a serious but popular guide of 19 4 6 . vvhich ainıed at explaining the
diflereııt historical strands of the movement - and its overriding
[25]
P A R İ S P O S T VVAR
moral consetısus - from which Sartre most conspicuously diverged.
The author's anxicties focus upon rlıe 'immorallty, pcrversion. por-
nography’ of existentialisl novels, and Sartre in particular."
Sartre's philosophy in its popularised form thus offered nevv frec-
doms to the young ’e.vistcntialists’ of Saint-Germain-des-Pres. free-
doms by delinition ascetic in austerity conditions. but modern
freedoıııs expressed through jazss music. American literatüre and
fashion. nevv forms ofson g and dance. scxual experiınentation and
innovation in the arts. The satirists vvere quick to attack: T h e exis-
tentialists vvho don’t go to bed any more meet from ten to midııight
at the Bar Vert. rue Jacob. vvhere they carvc cxistentlalist graftıti in
the vvater closets and telcphone booths . . . no obsccnities. no hearts
and arrows, but grave thoughts vvhich ponder about the void. the
tomb. suicide and Bikini atoll. İ lere is a randoın sample of these
sombre aphorisms: "D ay and night I dream about the animals on
Bikini atoll.’* "M an - that anim al that sings the Marseillaise” . . .
" If you don’t feel too good. get yoursclf felt by an Other.” ’8
These youthful *existentialists’ of Saint-Germain-des-Pres vvere
direct dcsccndants of the ‘zazou* teenage movement of the Oceupa-
tion. vvho themselves espouscd flicked-back lıair, platform shoes.
and jazz music. ’le svving’. The ’zazous’ had rebelled in a politically
intolerable situaöon.9 The jazz refrain to Isou’s pocm 'Svving':
Jingiliııgi. tingi lingi
. . . Bamagoula bamba goula
Sale ju if. . . Vichy . . . heil Mitler
recalls the racial hatred, the rouııd-ups. the deportations to Frenclı
transit camps vvhich vvere normal' at the time vvhich indeed. fifty
years later. havc only jusl been officially acknovvledged by the
Freııch govem m ent.10
Isou’s poem marks a collision betvveeıı history. experience and
avant-gardism. With his deliberate eclıo of the scorc strueture of
Cabaret Voltaire poems o f 1 9 1 6. he vvas promoting a Dada revi-
valism along vvith artists and critics suclı as Mielıel Tapie. vvhose
strategies vvill be discussed subsequently. Isou’s nevv movement.
Ut(risme, claimed to return poetry and literatüre to origins in the
letter itself- the sign’s priority over even the phoııeme - that vvas
just one of an explosion of attempts to define a nevv beginning for
art as a retum to origins. literally a starting from serateh.1 1
Dubuffet’s graftıti art. M ichaux’s ink blotehes. Artaud's sereams.
Giacometti's minute. thread-like sculptures ali slıare tlıis concern.
Despite the fact that these artists had reaclıed maturitv iıı the
19 308. they novv aimed to retrieve an authenticity. a sense of
beginning at the beginning vvhich vvas the only vvay to begin from
nothing. the imperative contained in Samuel Beckett's existentialist
pun: 'Comment c’est/[Commencez)’ (Hovv it is/l Begin j).1 * Wlıile tlıc
proliferating arenas of artistte debate in post-vvar Paris never spe-
cified a category of *existeııtialist art’ as suclı. the etlıos o f ’begin-
ııing from nothing’ correspoııds to Sartre’s theory. expounded in
the existentialisııı and humanism essoy, that existence prccedes
esscnce: *We mean that man first of ali cxists. cııcounters himself.
surges up in the vvorld and defines himself aftenvards.’ 1 * Primal
chaos. nevv beginnings: echoes of Sartrean ’autlıenticity’ inforıııed
these discussioııs of the nevv painting and sculpture.
U 6]
II Humanism and Terror
\Ve vvere never so free as under tlıc German Occupation . . . cach
thought vvas a concjuest: as an ali povverful poliçe souglıt to
silence us. each vvord became as precious as a declaration of
principle: as vve vvere pursued. each gesture had the vveiglıt of an
engagement.
lean-Paul Sartre. 19 4 4 '
Hovv is it possible that the period of epurution could in itself coııtain
a nostalgia for the period of Occupation? Paris under Occupation
became the privileged site of the double code - not only for the
age-old ’civil vvar’ amongst the Frenclı - but as a liett de memoire. a
placc of memory. in vvhich questions of authenticity and moral
value became rctrospectively uııproblematic absolutes. Sartre
recalled the hollovvness of the appearance of norıııality in occupied
Paris, the glıost tovvn vvith curfevvs and no traftıc. vvith its fake cul-
ture of thcatrical gaiety. and the vvindovv displays in food and wine
slıops. belied by the noticc etahuıe far tice (artificial display).* This
vvas very ıııuclı the scene pilloried in Dubuffet’s first Occupation
series of paintings includiııg the canvas callcd vvith bitter lıumour
’Vievv o f Paris. Life of Pleasure’ (fiıg.ı). A child-like excltemcnt vvas
conveyed by Dubuffet's friend Jean Paulhan in his evocation o f the
‘cops and robbers’ atmosphere of elandestinityh but his figlıt. anar­
d ı ic tone belied a deep moral disgust. *
Not for Paulhan vvas Sartre's rctrospectively digııified vision of
moral elarity. Paris, the place of enunciation’, the seat of the
Academie Fraııçaise and the institutions and publishing lıouses that
constituted the intelleetual life of the ııation. had been sullied. The
purge caıııpaign conducted by the National VVriters’ Committee
focused 011 vvriters for tlıcir symbolic funetion as scapegoats - and
for the simple reason that incrimiuatiııg fileş of published articles
vvere easy to collate. The publishers. the speculators. the industrial-
ists vvho financcd publishing ventures during the Occupation
escaped unseathed. Moral probity. clıoice. compromise - or vvriting
at the belıest of the official regimc - these vvere the dilemmas
’judged' by epuration committees. They precipitated the suicide of
Drieu la Kochelle. vvho had run Paullıan’s Nouvelle Revue Fraıı-
fıg.ı Jean Dubuffet Yicvv of Paris, Life of Pleasure l'cbrıınry 1944
Oil on canvas Prlvate Ccllection

çaise during the Occupation. The first death penalty w as announced
for a thirty-one year old jourııalist: opponents of the purgc vvaged
an unsuccessful campaign to save the brilliant young vvriter Robert
Brasillach.5 He spent his final days in the Fresnes prison \vhose
walls bore the last messages of deportees. despatched to their deatlıs
in Germany or Poland. Their pathetic graffiti are the key to suppres-
sed tragic resonances in Dubuffet’s art.6
VVell before the Liberation of Paris, a purge campaign had been
planned for the arts as part of the general programme laid dowıı by
the Front National Resistancc organisatioıı in March 19 4 4 . A ques-
tionnaire for a post-vvar arts policy widely circulated in August
19 4 4 by tlıc old administration merelv provided a useful list of col-
laborators for the nevv appoinlees. The Communist gallery director
of the late 19 30 S . Joseph Billiet. became Directeur General des
Beaux-Arts during the battle for Paris on 24 August. Arrest vvar-
rants for certain curators vvere issued the ncxt day. A11 epuration
session vvas hcld to discuss the Salon d’Automne. and maııifestos
and press releases denounced the French artists vvho had toured
Germ any in November 1 9 4 1 . The first president of the Front
National des Arts. Mauricc Deniş, had died in 19 4 3 . and vvas
replaced by Picasso who became the recipient of letters begging for
mercy. Picasso timed the momentous announcement that he had
joiııed the Communist Party to coincide vvith the ‘purged’ Salon
d’Automne. vvhere his retrospective of recent vvorks. m any filled
vvith the imagery of death. caused an uproar involving the lacer-
ation of many canvases. Defended in tlıc name of the National
YVriter’s Committce. vvho vvere responsible for the epuration of
vvriters. it vvas unthinkable that Picasso could renounce his links
vvith the policies o f the purge. Despite Billiet's fail from grace. the
epuration policy in the fine arts continued and the necessary
bureaucracy and m achinery for punislıment vvas set up. involving
the confıscatioıı of vvorks. vvithdravval of exhibiting rights. public
trial and fines.
The epuration, hovvever. vvas far more bloody than this specilic
situation in the art vvorld vvould suggest. It vvas a period of denun-
ciation. revenge killings. the settling of old scores and jcalousies.
and above ali of public trials vvith hastily assembled judicial appara-
tus. vvhich led to tlıc deatlıs of thousands of Frenchmen. Thus Fau-
trier’s Otayes exhibition. the hostage paintings and sculplures
shovvn at the Galerie Rene Drouin in 19 4 5 . had not merely a retro­
spective resonance. VVhile 'Oradour-sur-Glaııe' (no.35). one of his
most recent paintings. commemorated the ultimate. apparently
inexplicable German atrocity. the m assacre of 6 4 2 men. vvomen
and children. in a small Southern village as late as Juııe 19 4 4 , the
serial presentation of the ’Otages’ emphasised the anoııym ity of the
tortured vietims and implied the continuity of arrests. shootings,
and deatlıs that vvere the day-to-day stuff of the popular press.s
‘The shot victinı replaces the crucified One. the anonym ous man
replaces the painted Christs’. said Francis Ponge in his remarkable
Note sur U s Otayes of 19 4 6 . but his references to ‘anti-German una-
nim ity’, ’tlıe desire to kili the torturer’ and a ‘revengefui vvrath’
employ the familiar vocabulary of the epuration.9 The vvorking of
Fautrier’s pictorial ıııatter itself embodied the process of scarring
and bloodying. the tendcrııess and sadisııı. that vvere cxemplified by
the relationship betvvecn the torturer and his victinı. ‘Saralı’ and
'The Jevvess’. of 1 9 4 2 - 3 (n o s.2 6 -7) brought disturbing elements of
eroticism. rape aııd racial identity into the ecjuation. Indeed the
equivaleııce of the erotic relationship and that of the victinı and tor­
turer or executioner vvas explicitly ıııade by Georges Bataille. vvitlı
P A R İ S P O S T WA R
vvhom Fautrier collaborated on a clandestiııe edition of Madame
Edwarda at the very eııd of the Occupation. Bataille later clıosc an
epigraph for this text by Georg Hegel: ‘Death is vvhat is most ter-
rible, and to sustain the vvork of death deıııands the greatest povver.’
Eroticism itself. Bataille says, is visited upon tlıc conscience like a
dechirure - a rent or tear of the flesh - and this image is repeated as
the narrator kisses Edvvarda’s sex, 'an open vvound’ . ‘ Death itself
vvas at the fete, inasmuch as the ııudity of the bordello calls for the
buteher’s knife.’ 11 Metaplıors of open vvounds. indistinguishable
from scars, or from the female sex: these evocations from Bataille
coincide vvith Fautrier’s residual iiguratioıı and his private. ter-
rifyiııg memories as a 'voycur of death’. vvitnessing massacres in tlıc
Pare de Sceaux. Beauty, horror. intensity - and repetition: Fautrier
vvould create another hostage series in 19 5 6 . to conımemorate tlıe
Soviet invasion of Budapest.
The lugubrious liglıt of the still-vigorous dpuration campaign
illuminates Dubuffet's portrait series of 19 4 7 (nos. 1 6 - 1 7 ) . iroııi-
cally subtitled ‘More Beautiful tlıaıı They Thiıık. Beautiful in Spite
of Themselves'. Besides the key figüre of Jean Paulhan. others he
depictcd also contcsted the justice of the purge. The vvriter Paul
I^autaud. for example. had been a chief signatory of the letter canı-
paigniııg for the vvriter Brasillach’s relcase, calling tlıc epuration ‘a
repetition of 1 79 3 in the name of a pretended justice’.1 " ‘Paul Leau-
taııd vvith Caned Chair’ (fig.2). 'Leautaud. Red hıdian YV'izard'.
‘Leautaud Flabbergasted’. ‘Leautaud. General of the Eıııpire’ fea-
tured in Dubuffet’s shovv. as did 'Marcel Jouhandeau: Official Por­
trait'. ‘Jouhandeau. Little Secret Portrait’. ‘Jouhandeau vvith Big
Hars’. Jouhandeau vvas a vvriter vvho had certainly fratemised vvith
the German official Iitterati. Hmst Juııger and Gottfried Keller,
during the Occupation.1 3 Cahiers de la Pldiade, the journal vvith its
cover designed by Fautrier. vvhich published Dubuffet. Michaux.
Artaud aııd the poet Francis Ponge. also published tlıc exilcd anti-
semitic vvriter Louls-Ferdinand Celine as early as 19 4 8 .*4 It vvas the
forum for the ımü-epuration articles of Jean Paulhan. Paulhan had
lig.2 Jean Dubuffet Paul U'autaud vvitlı Caned Chair November 1946
Öil 011 canvas Private Collection
[27 i
P A R İ S P O S T VVAR

fuııctioned behind the sceııes in the Gallimard publishing housc

during the Occupation. and indeed ovved his life to Drieu la
Rochelle vvho officially took över his place. A personal frieııd to so
m any vvriters vvho published during the Occupation. Paulhan
employed ınetaphor and philological conceits to talk about the pol-
itical concept of Terror’ in literatüre: his position at odds vvith the
punitive vvriters* committee vvas c le a r.'5
Not only at the moment of Liberation but throughout the 1940S.
arguments for the justilication of the Epuration vvere based 011 the
legitimacy or othcrvvise of Petain’s governmeııt during the Occupa­
tion. Chapter and verse of constitutional lavv vvere cited by ex-Vichy
offıcials. attackiııg the legitimacy of the epuration - here Louis-
Dominique Girard's book Franco-French \\'arfare (19 5 0 ) is a key
document.16 Yet 'enliglıtened* and povverful intellectuals such as
Paulhan uscd the same argument: his U'tter to the Directors of the
Resistaıtce ( 19 5 1 ) . presenting official statistics - around 60.000
Frenchmen tortured. shot or burned ali ve at the Liberation -
appeared at the height of the debate över the mythologising of the
lig.3 Pablo Picasso 'llıc Chamcl I louse 194 5 Oil and charcoal on canvas
Resistance. creating a tremendous fu rore.'7 Museum of Modern Art. New York
The urge for reparation. for redress. above ali for ‘normalisation’
fought against the horror. just as 'normalisation* had been a policy
pursued by the Nazis during the Occupation of Paris. İt must be
remembered that 19 4 5 and 19 4 6 vvere years of a kind of mirror-
image reversal of artistic events of the vvar years: the Grand Palais
devoted to a multi-faceted shovv of Eııropean France during the Occu­
pation held one devoted to Hitler's Crlmes in 19 4 5 . The vvorks of art
stolen from French museums tlırough the Occupation - if not
destroyed at the Jeu de Paume itself. lost or damaged - vvere exhib-
ited as 'rediscovered masterpieces’ at the Orangerie des Tuileries in
19 4 6 .*8 The notioıı of'cultural property’ vvas at a premium. and.
as vvith the First VVorld War. in the shadovv of the recently bombed
cathcdrals such as Rouen. 'moral cathedrals’ fuelled debates on cul­
tural superiority. art. race. barbarism and reparation. as the School
of Paris vvas re-established.
Before officially reopening in 19 4 7 . the Mıısee national d’art
moderne held the exhibition Art and Resistance in February 19 4 6 .
lig.4 Boris Taslitzky The Small Camp. Buchcmvald 1943 Oil on canvas
the Hrst to build up images of tlıc French Resistance in painting and
Mıısee National d'Art Moderne. Ceııtre Ckorges Potupiden. Paris.
sculpture. A talking poiııt vvas Picasso’s ‘The Charnel House’ (fig. 3) Coıırtesıı of the Artist
vvith its tvvisted and interminglcd bodies spravvled in death under a
bare table. a postscript to 'Guernica*. Seeds of conllict vvere present,
hovvever. in the juxtapositioıı of vvork by Picasso and Boris Taslitzky
in the shovv. Taslitzky. bom in France. and a young militant for
engaged realism in the 19 30 S . had risked his life making dravvings
in Buclıenvvald. These vvere published vvith haste by the Communist
press. and in the vvake of Art and Resistance. various Communist
miııisters attended the opening of his exhibition Teınoignage (Things
Seen) in June 19 4 6 . vvhere T h e Small Camp. Bucheııvvald* (üg.4).
a historj* painting of the scale and aspiratioıı of a Gericault. vvas
purchased for the nation. Immediatcly it became the centrepiecc of
the nevvly opened Resistance Room in the Musee national d’art
moderne. Comparisons bctvveen Taslitzky*s ‘authenticity* and
Picasso’s style geııeratcd the bitter debate of autumn 19 4 6 about
realism and modernisin in the Communist Party raıık and İlle, pre-
ceding any cali for a ‘Socialist Realism* in 1 9 4 7 (indeed the party
had its ovvn promoters of abstract art at the time).19 Taslitzky’s
proximity to both Gruber and Giacometti. datiııg from Popular
Front days vvas evident - and it has been argued that for Gia­
cometti. the Popular Front period and his friendship vvith Gruber Hg.5 Francis Cruber Homage to |acqucs Callot 1942 Oil on canvas
vvere crucial for his ovvn rejeetion of Surrealism and retum to figu- Jacgues Bazainc. Paris
ration.1 "

(28i
 P A K I S P O S T VVAR

Gruber’s paintings of the early 19 40S are straııge am algam s: the

mutilatcd rcmains of history paintings surround conventional
depictions of the model in a studio. The ııaked and violated body in
a landscape, 'Homagc to Jacques Callot’ exhibited in 19 4 2 (fig.5),
vvith its iınplicit Resistance message. hailcd Gruber’s precursor from
Alsace-Lorraine. Callot’s ‘Horrors of War’ engravings vvere a source
for Gruber's spiky and fantastical facture: Giacometti also saluted
Callot in I 9 4 5 .21 Gruber's undernourished models in bare iııteriors
recalled ali the deprivation of the Occupation period. In ‘lob’
(110.68) the inside/outside space creates metaphysical ambiguities
as regards the notion of threshold. These correspoııd vvith Job's
lament to Jehovaiı in a moment of existcntial choice: tlıc leap of
faith or its abandonıııent. The iıııages of ııakedness and dereliction.
of fears, agoraphobic and claustroplıobic. could. one nıight specu-
late. be related to the inner feelings ofdoubling and mutilation
Gruber cxperienced because of his fatlıer’s German/AIsatian back-
ground.
Having joined the Communist Party in 1 9 44. Gruber vvas a
founder member. vvith Andre Marchand and Emmanuel Auricoste.
of the nevv Salon de Mai. vvhere the vvritings of Camus. Sartre and
the Communist poet Kugene Guillevic vvere exhibited in the literary
section. İn Art and Resistance. Gruber shovved paintings of ııaked
male corpses on an indeterminate grouııd: the boundarics betvvecn fig.6 Francis Gruber The Poet 1942 Oil on canvas
the notions of political and religious martyrdom became blurred - Private Collection
as they became bctvveen Catholic and Marxist versions of hunıa-
nism. The pro-modernist religious periodical Cahiersde l'Art Sacre
discussed the 'tragic' in contemporary painting involving not only
Catholic fıgurative painters such as Georges Rouault and Georges
Desvalliöres. but Andre ıVlarchaııd's ‘Crucifbrîon’ and the vvork of
Gruber.22
Certainly Gruber's vvork seeıııed to enıbody tlıc existential pre-
dicament in its amplitude. and its ambiguities. its n&ınt. one could
argue. being pregnant vvith the absent father in every sense, relig­
ious. sexual. political. And in a vvay. vvith his dcatlı in 19 4 8 .
Gruber himself became that absent father for a nevv generation of
painters vvho had emerged from the Salon des Moins de Trcntc Ans
(Salon of the Under-Thirties) started during the Occupation. The
future members of the Homme-Temoin (Man as VVitııess) group.
ineluding Bernard Buffet, first exhibited in this forum. Their realism.
under the aegis of Gruber. vvould attenıpt to distinguish itself from
Communist Socialist Realism after 19 4 8 . Despite the establishment-
orientated later career of Buffet. a direct line m ay be dravvn from
the ‘ Under-Thirties’ groupings. via Gruber and BufTet. to the salon
of the Peintres Temoiııs de I^urs Temps (Painters VVitness to their
Times) of the early 19 50 S. and the metamorphosis of the ‘Uııder-
Thirties’ into the Salon de la Jeuııc Peinture. founded in 1 9 5 3 .
vvhich would beconıe the hotbed of the politically engaged. post-
Staliııist ‘Nevv Figuration' movement in the i9 6 o s .2î
The dominance of Gruber’s heritagc and the povver of the nıytlı
of the *existentialist’ artist as the nevv peintre maudit (damned
painter) can be illustrated by a typical article of 1 9 5 1 . Claude
Roger-M arx’s *An Art of the Absürd or the Abseııcc of Hope in Con­
temporary Painting’.24 It jııxtaposed illustratioııs of Gruber’s hoııı-
age to Rimbaud. ‘The Poet’ 19 4 2 (tig.6). and Buffet’s ‘Solitude’
19 4 8 (fıg.7). a glum young m an seated behiııd a table witlı empty
bovvl. glass and bottle. Iıı both. the adolescent boy and. by implica-
tion. dreams of a future thvvarted by the ‘real’ . are the focus for a
painting vvhose ‘realism’ is an ambiguous sign for an im agiııary iig.7 Bernard Buffet Solitude (The Seated Drinker) 1948
departure from the present. Nineteenth-century artists 'vvhose exist- Oil on canvas Musee d’Art Moderne de la Ville de Paris

[29 i
P A R İ S P O S T WA R

ence vvas a daily calvary, vvho vvere ravaged by rnisery. ınadness

and suicide . . . a generation bom in suffering’ are linked to Buffet
and Minaux, vvhose vvork cvokcs *the cellar air they breatiıed as
children. the terror. the restrictions’. (îruber is the precursor: 'vvitlı
less auslerity Gruber created sinister reds. and sprcad the odour of
erime in a satanic space.’ Gruber's Titianesque. almost episcopal
luxuriance. the insistence on glazes in his ‘The Red Divan’ 19 4 4
(no.67) vvould be aboiished in favour of the seraped and scored
greys and bciges of BufTet’s ‘austerity’ palette vvhile Buffet appro-
priated Gruber’s motifs. in 1 9 5 1 . Roger-Marx’s artide vvas already
the sign of a covert nostalgia for the purity of enterprise. authentic
povcrty and determination (Gruber) vvhich Buffet’s meteorically
successfui career contradicted. Buffet's canvases. easily legible as
representations o f ‘Katka, Sartre. the conccntration camps. food
rationing. the housing crisis* spavvned a fashion in the 195OS. in
lig.8 Boris Tasiit/ky The Death of Danielle Casanova 1950 Musee d'Histolre
direct conjunction vvith the consumer boom. *Existentialism' as rep-
Monlreuil Courtesy of the Artist
resented in the miserabiliste mode of Buffet and his imitators.
became a fashion devoted to the cult of its most glamourous expo-
n e n ts- the very exemplars. ironically. ofSartrean ‘had faith’.25 LĞger and Matissc. Trotskyist discussions took place in the studios of
Just as the eschatological dimensions of Gruber's ’Job’ (110.68). both the Geometric Abstract artists and the Surrealists. Genevieve
or of Buffet’s 'Crucifixion' series mediated betvveen agnostic and Bonnefoi. a participant in the 19 so s' art vvorld. ııovv a distin-
Catholic existentiaiist positioııs. so the eschatological dimensions of guishcd critic and curator. has vvritten of the ‘mechanism of "tvvo
Communist doctrine. first discussed in the 1 930S. vvere correspond- terrors” ' at the time: Socialist Realism and Geometric Abstraction.
iııgly emphasised in Socialist Realist painting. After 19 4 7 . ousted Escape tovvards the Infomıei. tovvards ‘open’ representation in free
from government, the French Communist Party opposcd the Mar- gesture - the existential altemative - seemed the only possible vvay
shall Plan and espoused Kominterıı positioııs in the arts. Conven- out.31 The political arguments. alas. continued: the Soviet labour
tionai religious tropes structured hard-line Socialist Realist camp question continued to split the Left in a vile propaganda vvar.
paintings. just as hagiographical traditions vvere employed by modificd only after 19 5 6 vvith the revelation of Stalin’s crimes.
vvriters and propagandists.1 *’ Iıı 1 9 5 1 . vvith misirabilisme at its Humanism and terror: the debate vvould dominate the post-vvar
heiglıt. AııdrĞ Fougeron’s ‘ i.e Pays des Miııes’ series presented a period.31
mining accident victinı laid out like Holbein’s dead Christ: Boris
Taslitzky's ‘Death of Danielle Casanova' 1 9 5 0 (fig.8) depicted the
Communist heroine’s death at Auschvvitz in conventional hagiogra­
phical terms based on Zurbaran and Gericault. Socialist Realism as
III Cezanne’s Doubt: Painters of Failııre
a phenomeııon is at last ackııovvledged as a majör - albeit not domi­
nant - phenomenon of the period.17 Hovvever. my emplıasis here
If. in Cezanne’s times. painting an apple vvas a very advanced
ıııust regard the Communist position in the ‘lıumanism and terror’.
intelleetual position. to make lıistory painting in the era of
debate vvhich divided post-vvar intelleetuals.
'Guernica' and the extemıination camps is also a very Progres­
At the heiglıt of the prestige of the Communist Party. the party
sive intelleetual aııd moral position.
o f '7 5 .0 0 0 fusilles’ (vietims shot dead). Artlıur Koestler published
Francis Gruber. 1 9 4 5 1
Darkness at Noon. a ghastly parable of life under Communist rule.
implicltly referring to the notorious shovv trials and purges of the Gruber’s position of a realist engagement vvith lıistory ıııust be dir-
late 1930S. In 19 4 7 . Maurice Merlcau-Ponty. joiııt editör of Les ectly opposed to painters in post-vvar Paris vvho looked to Cezamıe.
Temps Motlerııes vvith Jean-Paul Sartre. published Uıımanism and A ’sclıool of Cezanne’ vvas formcd iıı Aix-en-Provence during and
Terror: Essay on the Communist Problem in response to Koestler’s after the Second VVorld VVar that atfected the semi-abstract laııd-
attack. Merleau-Ponty’s explicit resuscitatioıı of the problem of the scape paintings o f ‘lyrical abstractionists’ such as Pierre Tal-Coat.1
Soviet shovv trials of the 1 9 3 0 S and attempts to justify tlıeııı in The adoptioıı of Cezanne as both a moral and paiııterly model by an
terms of the ‘greater good’ of the revolution presented moral and artist like Giacometti is nıore signiHcant. indeed Giacometti's pos­
political conundrums in the conte.\t of a purge that had inescapable ition during the crucial years of friendship vvith Gruber. 19 3 6 - 9 .
parallels vvith the epuration climate.28 hovercd betvveen the challenge of political realism as ‘engageıııcnt'
Follovving Merleau-Ponty’s publicatioıı. the Kravchenko scandal and the lessons of Cezanne: the tvvo ‘Apple’ paintings and tlıc por­
in 19 4 9 gave the debate över Soviet labour camps nevv impetus:19 trait of his mother. crucial for his vvork of the 1 940S. dale from
the threat of atomic destruetion and a third vvorld vvar seemed ever 1937.
nearer and became a subject for Salon paintings such as Bernard Maurice Merleau-Ponty’s extensive essay. ‘Cezanne’s Doubt' vvas
Lorjou's huge ‘Anecdotes of the Atomic A ge’ 1 9 5 0 .30 As positioııs published in the revievv Fontaine in 19 4 5 and in his collcction of
polarised. arguments became more strident: the press campaigns in 19 4 8 . Sense and Non-Sense.* Altlıouglı nıore evidence is required of
favour of Socialist Realism in Les U'ttres Erançaises for exanıpie. are specilic responses to Merleau-Ponty’s text. it vvas surely crucial for
astonishing in their amplitude at tlıe saıııe time as the Communist artists such as Braııı van Veide vvho savv not oııly their vvork itself.
Party actively promoted the vvork of the ‘late modems*. Picasso. but their ovvn ‘failııre’ in a Cezanııesque mode exemplifying an cxis-

1 30)

tentialist predicament. Cezanne reappeared in sections ofM erleau-
Ponty's Phenomenology of Perception (19 4 5 ). vvithin a vastly conıplex
elaboratioıı of philosophical and pcrceptual schemata. His exem-
plary position vvas thus re-emphasised. and far from pure nıisera-
bilisme, for painters of the post-vvar generation. Cözannc’s visuai
povver pointed to tlıc ultimate triıımph of his fortitude.4
‘Painting vvas his vvorld and his existence* Merleau-Ponty
deciared of the artist. ‘Anxiety vvas the basis of his character.'
Cezanne provided a model of asceticism. his Iife's vvork doomed to
failure as a saiııt's is doomed to iınperlection. Merleau-Ponty posited
a ‘morbid constitution . . . sehizophrenia . . . a fliglıt from the vvorld
of human beings. the alienation of his humanity'. Cezanne vvished
to paint ‘a primordial vvorld’ vvith an emplıasis on the iramediate
traııslation of sensation. Moreover ‘He did not vvant to distinguish
the fixed objects vvhich appear before our eyes from the fleeting vvay
in which they appear’. Cezanne vvas deemed able to suspend habits
of thought and perception, alicnatiııg the speetator in ‘a vvorld
vvithout familiarity. vvlıere vve are not at ease’.s Merleau-Ponty
refers not only to Balzac’s artist Frenhofer in The Llnknown Master-
piece and his canvas of scribblcd liııcs represeııting nothing6 - but
surprisingly has a long excursus 011 Sigmuııd Freud’s vvritings on
heonardo da Vinci: a blueprint for the psyclıoanalysis of the artist,
anticipating Sartre’s existential biography of Jean Genet.
Simply. I vvould propose that. before Sartre's vvritings 011 the art
of YVols or Giacometti. Merleau-Ponty produced a paradigm of the
'existentialist' artist full of coııtemporary resonances.7 His subse-
quent abandonmeııt of the problems of the individual. tlıc status of
individual creation and individual failure. to concentrate upon
broader political dilemmas is telling. By coıısidering ‘Cezanne’s
Doubt' in juxtaposition vvith Humanism and Terror. the relative
claims of artist, philosoplıcr and the discourse 011 art versus political
vvriting and political eııgagement are lirmly contextualised in the
years 19 4 5 - 7 . vvith the latter. fînally. prioritised.
Fchoing and corroborating Merleau-Ponty's tcxt. Branı van
Velde ıvrote in 19 48 : ‘Only men vvho are sick can be artists. It's
their suffering vvhich pushes them to do things vvhich put sense
back into the vvorld. The sensitive man or the artist can only be sick
in our civilised life full of lies . . . Painting is man confroııtiııg catas-
troplıe . . . I paint my misery.’ The vocabulary of Sartre is also dis-
ccrnible vvlıen Bram van Velde speaks of ‘Pictorial styles or the
struggle vvith the void . . . the desire for the non-real. to escape the
mesh’ (Sartre’s metaplıor of eııtrapment. Tcngrenage).*
Samuel Beckett’s preface upon the bıothers Geer and Bram van
Velde. ‘ Painters of Failure' echoes Merleau-Ponty and Bram himself:
‘tlıe knovvledge of the contingent preceeds that of substance. . .
Their painting is an analysis of a state of privation . . . one in terms
of light and emptiness. one in terms of the inside, obscurity. fullııess
and plıosphorescences.’^
The dravviııg of tlıc artists into Beckett’s ovvn circles of Hell is
expressed more punehily: ‘The situatioıı is that of İıim vvho is help-
less. cannot act. in the event cannot paint. since he is obliged to
paint. the act is of İıim vvho. helpless. unable to act. aets. in the
event paints. since he is obliged to paint.’ 10
This topical. existentialist language linked vvitlı the imagery of
austerity and absurdity. served to mask pictorial struggles. displac-
ing formal analysis. (YVas not Bram's failure a failure to escape
Picasso in terms of both forms and palette?) Yet the very real depri-
vations of the early 19 40 S continued for m any into the next decade.
The glamorous lifestyle of Buffet or of Georges Mathieu during the
P A R İ S P OS T VVAR
195OS should be compared vvitlı that of the far older artist. Bram
van Velde. vvhose support from the Galerie Maeghl eııded abruptly
after his third disastrous shovv in 19 5 2 . Bare vvalls. simplicity. a
dignity vvhich conceals the eflbrt of confroııtiııg the blank canvas:
poignant images vvith a mytlıologising povver vvere cauglıt by pho*
tograplıers such as Brassaı and Denişe Coiomb. High seriousness.
an iııtcnse level ofcreativity and debate. persistence in spite of
vvorldly failure - this paradigm is tlıc very antithesis of tlıose plıoto-
graphs of the craziııess of Saint-Germain youth culture: the sym-
bolic release of the youth of the Atomic Age. in carnival. in excess.
in the culture of the T a b o u .'1
IV The Theatre of Cruelty
There is a connectioıı betvveen the sclıizoid constitution and
Cezanne’s vvork because the vvork reveals a metaphysical sense
of his illness. If vve see sehizophrenia as a state of mind in vvhich
the vvorld becomes reduced to the sum of ali its physical experi-
ences but as if frozeıı and as a suspension of cxpressive values.
then the illness. in Cezanne’s case, ceases to be an absurdity and
a fate. and becomcs a general possibility of human existence
vvlıen it resolutely attacks one of its paradoxcs: the plıenonıenon
of cxpression as such.
Maurice Merleau-Ponty. 19 45 *
Sehizophrenia as an element in the debate on art and 'authenticity'
extended the questions raised under the aegis of existentialism to
areas of the mind-body relationship. its dislocation. physical and
mental cruelty. ‘Insane’ art, called in French Tart des fous or Tart
psychopathologigue had çonstituted a parallel discourse vvith that of
modernisin since debates about Van Gogh at the turn of the cen-
tury.2
İronically it vvas the Van Gogh exhibition in Paris in 19 4 7 .
possibly the most successful museum exhibition of the period. that
precipitated the most savage indietment of society by the vvriter
Antonin Artaud. Artaud. his body consumed by drug abuse,
medicatioıı and self-ııeglect had linked the concept of physical
catharsis vvitlı a rilualistic, violent anti-realism Central to his
‘Theatre of Cruelty'. baptiscd in 1 9 3 6 . 1-lc novv spoke vvitlı the autlı-
oritv of one ı ecently released from years of incarceration and elec-
troshock treatment in psychiatric hospitals. and in the vvake of the
first exhibition in the Sainte-Anne psychiatric hospital of the vvorks
of the mentally sick in 19 4 6 - a deliberate riposte to the campaign
against ‘degenerate’ art by the Nazis. A great public success. this
shovv had coincided vvith Jean Dubuffet’s first attempls to proıııote
vvhat he called art brüt, an art made on the margins of society. A
■psychiatric’ article on Van Gogh in the vveekly Arts quoting Dr Joa-
clılm Beer’s dcscriptioıı of the artist as a ‘degenerate of the Magnan
type' vvas the catalyst for Artaud's magnificent response: Van Gogh.
the Man Suicided by Society.{ His Vision vvas grimnıer even than the
vvorld of the purge conımittecs: 'And thus. demented as this asser-
tion nıay seem. preseni day life goes 011 in its old atmosphere of pru-
rience. of anarehy. of disorder. of delirium. of demeııtia. of chronic
lunacy. of bourgeois iııertia. of psychic anomaly (for it isn’t man but
the vvorld that has become abııormal) of deliberate dishoııosty and
dovvııright hypocrisy. of a mean contempt for anythiııg that slıovvs
breeding.’4 In the preface to the exhibitioıı of his ovvn reıııarkable
P A R İ S P O S T WA R
crayon portraits at the Galcric Pierre in June 19 4 7 . Artaud wrote:
‘The human face is an empty forcc, a field of death . . . Only Van
Cîogh knevv how to draw from a human head a portrait vvhich
vvould be the explosive smoke from the beatiııg of a bursting
heart.’’ .
Artaud had vvorked alongside Sürrealist artists before and
during his incarceration: the genuine schizophrenic Guillaumc
Pujolle vvas painting at the hospltal Rodez vvhen Artaud began his
ovvn dravvings. Artaud literally embodied and bodied forth the art
and madness debate. involving it intimately vvith considerations of
cruelty and abusc. Extreme violence vvas pcrpetrated upon lan-
guage itself: his mother tongue vvas attacked by reminiscences of
Tarahumara Mexican İndian chants and pure glossolalia - a substi-
tute lor the tearlng and screaming body. bound and subject to elec-
troshock agony. the subject of so m any dravvings:
o penis ta penis
atura
o petura a petur peni
ta ksartam
ta kharon.6
Artaud's three-lıour performance at the Vleux-Colombier theatre
in January 19 47- und his group radio recital. T o İlave Done vvith
the Judgcmcnt ofGod* plaııned for broadcast in February 19 4 8
(prohibited and subsequently pirated). presented almost intolerable
sights and sounds of human anguish.7 The startling realism of
Artaud's portraits exhibited in the same year as Dubuffet's portraits.
19 4 7 . demonstrates the realisation of his belief in the posslbilities of
a strong art vvithout origins: *1 havc definitely broken vvith art. style
or talent in the dravvings displayed here . . . cursed be he vvho con-
siders them vvorks of art. vvorks of the esthetic stimulation of reality.
None is properly speaking a vvork. They are ali sketches or should I
say staggcring blovvs given in ali the directions of chaııce. possibil-
ity. hazard or destiny.’8
Artaud’s realism is disturbingly self-reflexive: ‘Artaud's ovvn face
appears in ali these portraits, compacted into the face of the sitter.
so that they are ali double portraits of Artaud and the subject
vvhose face he vvas interrogating in the dravving.'9 Recognition
becomes identity: the red crayon ‘Portrait of Arthur Adam ov’
(110.10). for examplc. a homage to the vvriters autobiographical
expose. The Confession. commemorates a life vvhich like Artaud’s
vvas marked, according to his fricnd Georges Bataille. vvith ‘sickness.
neurosis. vice . . . Adamov seems to have risen up out of a black
imagination avid for a coloured horror that alone might attenuate
the grotesque. somehovv grandiloquent aspect that crushes the
heart.’ 10 It is not vvithout relevance to both Artaud's portraits and
M ichaux’s obsessive preoccupation with the head. that jacques
Lacan’s essay on the ‘mirror stage’. conceived in 19 36. vvas pub­
lished in 1 9 4 9 . '1 Michaux abhorred mirrors and refused to look at
his ovvn image: thus his dravvings as proccsses of both apparition
and exorcism are intimately related to problems of identity and rep-
resentation: Ifl paint mad-looking lıcads. its not to say that I'm
mad in those moments . . . the madness then of vvatching the paper
soak up the ink too quickly. or the blot making me deviate from my
original design. this madness calls up in me almost at once the echo
of tlıousands of madnesses stemming from my none-too-happy
p a s t’ ”
The focus on sehizophrenia continued vvhen the International
l:\hibition of Psychopatholoyical Art (planned as early as November
İ32İ
lig.9 Antonin Artaud Detestaıion of the Father-
Mother April 1946 Pencll. Pastel and vvatcrcolour on
paper Muste National d'Art Modeme. Centre Georges
Pompidou, Paris
19 48 ) vvas held at the Sainte-Anne psychiatric hospital in 19 5 0 .
in conjuııction vvith the lîrsl YVorld Congress ofPsychiatry. Jean
Dubuffet. vvho damned the shovv. vvas not asked to lend.1 i Though
this exhibltion momentarily eelipsed his ovvn art brıa collection. his
promotion o f Art lirin Preferred to Cıdtural Arts. as exhibited at the
Galerie Rene Drouin in 19 49 . a mixture of schizoplırenic and naive
art. vvould continue through the decade. While Dubuffet’s interest
in this kind of art capitalised on discoveries and publications
already familiar to the Surrealists. and Andre Breton’s act i ve com-
mitment to the Foyerde Varı brüt vvas considerable from 1 9 4 7 - 5 1 .
the Sürrealist Icader broke vvith Dubuffet. Breton’s ovvn mcdical
iııvolvement vvith psychiatry. his avvareııess of the pain and isola-
tion of dementia. differed vastly from Dubuffet’s sense of fete. his
celebration of the mytlı of the ‘common man'. İn Dubuffet’s public
presentation of an art brııt - so ostensibly elose at times to aspects of
his ovvn vvork - the artist supressed the tragedy of sehizophrenia or
of lifelong institutionalisatioıı. only once admitting: ‘They are
people for vvhom. indeed. everything is lost. No enterprise can offer
them any hope. They have to confront the human condition
reduced to a minimum, at its extreme p oint."4 İn 19 6 0 . a majör
Dubuffet retrospeetive at the Musee des arts decoratifs lıeralded the
consecration of the art brüt collection in the same museum seven
years later. The final visibility of schlzophrenlc art coiııcided vvith a
stream of posthumously published texts by Artaud. Botlı Michcl
Foucauit and Jacques Derrida put sanity. identity. and ‘voice’ at the
heart of their vvritings in the 1 96OS.
Such issues coııfronted Sartre’s philosophical position from the
outset. First. Merleau-Ponty had resited philosophical consciousness
vvithin the perceiving, spatialised and sexualised body in Psycholoyy
of Perception (19 4 5 ). In addition. he brought both behavloural
Sciences and Saussurian linguistics onto the agenda of the College
de France before 19 5 2 .1 s Concurrently. the discourses of sehizo­
phrenia and vvith it psychosexual and psyclıosomatic disturbances

involving the rebellioııs body and its languages. challenged the
premises of aııtodetermination and ‘freedom’ at the heart of Sartre’s
critical and philosophical enterprise.
V Matter and Memory: A Nevv Primitivism
The eşsential gesture of the painter is to cover a surface . . . to
phınge his hands into full buckets or bovvls. and vvith his palms
and lingers to putty över the vvall surface vvith his d av. his
pastes. to kncad it body to body. to leave as imprints the most
immediate traces of his thoııght, the rhythms and impulses that
beat in his arteries and ruıı along his nerves.
Jean Dubuffet. 1 9 4 5 1
VVhat Sartre called Henri Bergson's ‘philosophical revolution' in The
imagination (19 3 6 ). became crucial for his Iater vvritings. as vvas
Gaston Bachelard's focus on imagination. reverie (daydreaming)
and primal matter.* Bachelard. an extraordinari!y imaginative
autodidact. took up the chair in the lıistory and philosophy of
science at the Sorbonne in 19 4 0 . Both Bergson and Bachelard vvere
important and explicitly acknovvledged sources for post-vvar artists
before Sartre himself entered the arena of contemporary art eriti­
cisin. Bergson vvas saluted in Dubuffet’s ’ Matiere et memoire’ series
and Bachelardian ideas of matter pcrmcate his meditations on
vvalls. ’l.cs Murs’ vvhich vvere exhibited at the Galerie Andre in
April. T945 (see n o .15 5 -6 ) . Tlıc poet Francis Ponge’s tcxt for
Dııbufîet. Matiere el memoire adopted Bergson’s title of 18 96 .
m a kin g an explicit homage to the aged plıilosopher vvhose refusal
to renounce his Jevvish roots or seek prefereııtial treatment had led
to an igııominious death during the Occupation.1
Dubuffet’s ferocious lithographs in the ‘Matiere et memoire’
series of the ‘Teleplıone Torture Victinı' (lig.ıo) or the 'Shortlıand
Typist’ vvere promoted together vvith folk art and sign-painting
agaiııst the ‘Greekeries’ of the Wcstcrn hümanist tradition in an
important lecture of January 19 4 5 that could be seen as the mani­
festo of his idea of the art of tlıc ‘common m an’.4 Rcflections upon
the ’memory’ of the litlıographic stone in Ponge’s Matiere et
memoire preface iııdicated the vvork itself as the latest ‘brutality’ in a
series of palimpsests going back to 'aıı ancient Daumier'. Daumier
recalls the long tradition of French political caricature vvhich resur-
faced in Dubuffet’s vvork. sullying the innocence of his child art
sources. And in contrast to Dauıııier's position at the heart of social
life. Ponge’s reference to Brassai’s studics of gralfiti evoked a dis-
turbing marginality.
'riıe vvalls in the ‘Murs’ series of paintings and lithographs repre-
sent the arca of Paris kııovvıı as the ’zone’, frequented by society’s
rejects of ali deseriptions: it vvas vvhere roads turned into mud
tracks, vvhere territory vvas staked out as allotments. vvhere mıırder
vietims vvere surreptitiously buried. vvhere executions vvere carried
out before and after August j 944. This vvas the area frequented by
Dubuffet's ‘common m an’, vvhose argot (the coded slatıg of the sub-
culture) vvas parodied in Dubuffet’s ovvn vvritings vvhich ıııay be
compared vvitlı tlıose of Louis-Ferdinaııd Celine. Both men revelled
in aııarchy. an almost criminal menace and an elevation of the
scatological into a metaphysical system.
In the paintings of vvalls and the images madc vvith iıık on litho-
graplıic stone a sense of identity betvveen material and reprcseııta-
P A R İ S P O S T VVAR
fig. 1 o Jean Dubuffet Telcphone Torture Victinı
l.ithograph from Matiere et memoire, pl.30 (n.d.) (1944)
tion vvas created vvith stoııe-coloured. gravelly or tar-macadaııı
surfaces.' Matiere itself became eonsubstaııtial vvith representation
as memoire: a fusion of remembered. imaginary and aetual images
vvas achieved. Dubuffet’s next adventure vvas to move from gravel
and macadam to the lıautes pâtes or ‘raised pastes’ vvhich involved
a more coıııplex philosophy. ’BufTooıı. charlataıı. paints vvith shit,
plays the baby. a pimple-seratehing aesthetic': the critics vvere pro-
voked and disturbed.6 Dubulîet started vvork on his lıautes ptîles in
April or May 19 4 5 . Fautrier's ‘Otagcs*. created vvith thick impastos
during the Occupation, vvere shovvtı in October 19 4 5 . before
Dubuffet’s shovved his lıautes pâtes in the Mirobolus. Macadam el Cie
exhibitioıı of Junc 19 4 6 . also at the Galerie Rene Drouin. Beyond
any debate on Fautrier’s teehnieal prccedcnce. I vvould propose
that Dubuffet and perhaps Fautrier. too. vvere avvare of Gaston
Bachelard's lectures at the College de France during the Occupa­
tion. It vvas here that the first tlıcorisings upon the pâte as primal
matter vvere voiced to a distinguished audience of poets. vvriters.
artists and tramps slıeltering from the cold." Bachelard's Waterand
Dreams. published in 19 4 2 . posits a ’mesomorphic imagination’ in
betvveen the formal and the ‘material’ imagination: ‘Mesomorphic
dream-objects assume fonn vvith difficulty and tlıen lose it. gradu-
ally subsiding like dough [iimc prftı]. The viscous. soft. lazy ob ject.. .
corresponds to the strongest ontological density in dream-life'. The
primitive Homo t’aber is evoked. for vvlıonı kneadiııg (elay or dough)
is a ‘contiııuous dreaııı. vvork done vvith tlıc eyes s h u t. . . intimate
reverie’. His vvork is linked to the dominating character of la duree
(the tlux of time): rhytlım. (Bergson as precursor is obvious here.)
T h is reverie born from the vvork of kneadiııg is necessarily linked
vvith a particular vvill to povver. the male joy of penetrating into
substance. of feeling the inside of substances . . . the hand becomes
conscious of the Progressive success of the unioıı of eartlı and
vvater’. The duree is iııscribed in the matter itself. a duree vvithout
particular ainıs. a ‘becomiııg’ of substance itself.8 Compare
Dubufi’e t’s lıautes pâtes vvith this text. iıı particular his aggressively
I 331
P A R İ S P O S T WAR

ııaked male figüre. *Will lo Power' (fig.ı i ). It combines a rich.

thickly worked matter. an outrageous phallicism and a dcliberately
Nietzschean titlc. Bachelard’s link bet\veen his elemental and pri-
mordial theorisings of the pâte and those of tlıc infant’s first mat­
erial grasp of the vvorld tally vvith contemporary interest in child
mentalities that vvould reappear in Merleau-Ponty’s Sorbonne Iec-
tures later in the 19 40S.9 Bachelard declared: 'It is in the flesh. in
the organs that the first material images are born. These first mat­
erial images are dynamic. active. they are linked to desires [volonU?]
that are simple. astonishingly crudc'.10 He refers to Juııg. and to the
conccpt of iııfant libido in psychoanaiysis. His discourse m ay be
seen to iııfuse Fautrier’s disturbing ‘Baby’ series vvithin the ‘Otages*
(a ‘primal’ reading of the Massacre of the Innocents?) and to surface
again in Dubuffet's 'Corps de Dames' (Ladies’ Bodics) (see ‘Olympia’
fig.ı 2. 'Gymnosoplıie.' no.20). vvhere the maternal body spreads
out, almost coterminous vvith the canvas bouııdaries.
Bachelard moves from a consideratioıı of tlıc pâte to the yrcffe or
graft. and opposes his conccpt of the ‘dynamic haııd' to Bergson’s
conccpt of the ‘geometric hand' of Hoıno laber - the first man to
make tools and designs. Again. conıpare Dubuffet. vvhose brilliaııt
reflcctions upon the lıautes pâtes are instinct vvith Bachelardian
vocabulary and ideas: ’Nourislı yourself vvith inscriptions.
instinctive traces. respect the impulses. the ancestral spontaneities
of the lıunıan hand vvhen it traces signs. One should feci man and
his vveaknesses (maladresses) in ali the details of the picture. Like-
vvise the chance events pertaiııiııg to the materials used, the lig. 1 1 Jean Dubuffet Willto Povver 1947 Oil vvith gravel.
lıazards of the hand.’ 1 1 string. pebblcs and broken ghıss on canvas Private Collection
Bachelard's later vvritings may continue to be read in tandeııı
vvith Dubuffet’s elaboratc productions. Interestingly. in Earth and tlıe
Dreanıs of Will (19 4 7 ) vvhich has another wlıole chapter on La Pâte,
Bachelard returns to an extensive analysis of Sartre's \ausea. vvhere
Roquentin’s ‘nausca in his haııds’ stimulates Bachelard's reflections
on a ‘m aııual im agination'.12 Evidcntly the philosophy of la pâte.
the key to a reading of the nevv post-vvar Informel painting vvas a
product of vvhat vvould tıovv be classified as a highly ‘intertextual’
sitııation: a series of interpenetratiııg rcadings and quotations from
texts that vvere translated into matiere, into painting practice (one
must emphasise that both Sartre’s and Bachelard’s books vvere
highly popular).
Yet other sources interfered vvith these readiııgs from the start.
The Mirobolus, Macadam et Cie, lıautes pâtes de Jean Dubuffet exhibi-
tion catalogue vvas prcfaccd by the vvriter, neo-Dadaist and jazz
player Michel Tapie. YV'hile acknovvledgiııg an array of powerful
artistic precursors. as had Dubuffet himself. it vvas Tapie's emplıasis
upon indigenous and anonymous sources. prehistoric. Gallic and
Romanesque. that signalled the definitioıı of a nevv primitivism for
the 194OS. This primitivism vvas divorced from the spoils and the
‘anthropology’ of the Trocadero. the exotic fascinations of the
returning Surrealists: 'Dubuffet must certainly descend from the
god 1, a u g h t e r of our ancestors the gauls’. 1* Yet. vvith his epigraph lig. r 2 Jean Dubuffet Olympia April 1950 Oil on canvas Private Collection
by Nietzsche: ‘oııe must have chaos vvithin'. Tapie called Dubuffet’s
vvorks ‘less paintings than beııevolently endothermic supports* and
proclaimed that Dubuffet’s man is 'entirely open. avvare of himself
in the present and his potential future and in certain signs as old as
the vvorld.’ Tapie’s vvriting on the Informel, pulling avvay from the
Bergsonian and Bachelardian nexus of matter and memory tovvards
neo-Dada and the nevv. multidiscipliııary iııputs of vvhat he called
an art autre (an other art) is discussed on p p .4 5-6.

I 341

VI Under the Sign of Sartre
Read Hcidegger and the phenomenologers: yoıı will find ali the
detail of the appearance ‘vvith aııgst’ of the object.
Jean Paulhan to Fautrier. c. 1 9 4 2 - 4 ’
I haven't quite got round to any precise coııception of what exis-
tentialism actually is . . . Noııetheless I feci and declare myself to
be warınly existentialist.
Jean Dubuffet, 1946^
The vvritings of Bachelard. of Merleau-Ponty. of Paulhan. of Ponge.
o f Dubuffet himself vvere articulating important ideas about post-
vvar art long before Sartre’s first cxhibition preface of 19 46 . Paul-
han's advice to Fautrier provcs that artists and vvriters vvere going
back for ‘phenomenological’ inspiration to the same sources as
Sartre himself. without the philosopher’s mediation. Can one,
indeed. define an ‘existentialist art’? As a term it did not exist. The
collision betvveen the cult of Saint-Germain-dcs-Pr6s and Sartre’s
philosophy created fields of interference and interaction vvhich only
the memoirs of figures like Simone de Beauvoir. the singer Juliette
Greco and the vvriter and jazz musician Boris Vian can chronicle
vvith justice. Hovvever. under discussion here is Sartre’s specific
relationships vvith artists and his impact upon certain cultural dis-
courses.
Sartre's The lınaglnation and The Psychology of the imagination of
19 3 6 and T94ü posed tlıc problem of the imagined versus the per-
ceived image. His writings on art published in the luxury art m aga­
zine Verve before the vvar. like his novel Nausea, are çoııcerned vvith
contingent organic life, consciousness and its meaning versus
‘Official Portraits' vvhich petrify a politically controlled image in
paint or bronze.5 In The Psychology of the İmagination. Sartre posited
presence through absence: ‘The imagining consciousness poses its
object as an absence’ (un neaııt). Pierre is in Berlin but is imagined
in Paris, a conccpt adduced. as I have shovvn. in the existentia!ism
versus humanism controversy. More importantly in terms of post-
iig. 1 3 VVols. fro n tis p ie c e fo r Je a n - P a ııl S a r t r e . V isayes. 1 9 4 8 D ry p o in t
F A K IS POST W A R
vvar developments in Informel painting - but vvithout mentioniııg
any artists - Sartre discussed the irrational. ‘magic’ status of the
image. ’Faces in flames. stains on vvalls. roeks in human form’, hyp-
nagogic and crystal bali images and the slıift from the pictorial
matter of a portrait to mental images. A final seetion, vvritten as a
PostScript, specifically addresses tlıc *existential type of the vvork of
art’ vvhere tlıe portrait image versus its material analogue is again
the crux of the chapter although music aııd the concept of beauty
are also addressed.4
Sartre’s later notion of man as ‘ııot definable . . . because to begiıı
vvith he is nothing- subscribed to an ’autochthonic’ myth, an
‘unborn’ beiııg of ‘pure consciousness’, consonant vvith both the
Descartes's cogitv and tlıe traditional aııthorial position in philo­
sophical vvritings. This consciousness vvas essentially divorced from
the material vvorld: ’We are left aloııc. vvithout excuse. Man is con-
denıned to bc free . . . There is no reality except in aetion.’5
The vvlıole thrust of the vvritings of Sartre's rival. Merlcau-Poııty.
vvhose Phenomenobgy of Perception came out in 19 4 5 . vvas to root
the tradition of traıısccndcntal philosophy from Descartes to Kant
and beyond. back in tlıc living. perceiviııg, sexuaiised body. The
argument - of freedom versus embodiment - ‘pure’ consciousness
versus a consciousness at every moment stecped in avvareness of
itself and its mental and bodily memories can be seen to echo the
arguments for nevv beginnings. an arı autre (Tapie). versus memory-
laden readiııgs of the Informel.
indeed. Sartre’s promotion of a free and self-determiniııg con­
sciousness stands in contrast to the loss of perceptual control under
the influence of drugs and hallucinations that iııformed his first
drafts of The Psychology of the İmagination - some time after his
encounter vvith German phenomenology in Berlin and his first
drafts of ‘Melancholia’. later renamed Nausea.b These experiences
paradoxically allied his vvriting to the Sürrealist precedent. The
melaneholy and the viscosity at the heart of the vision of a Dalı
became transformed in Nausea. vvhich vvas eventually published iıı
1 9 3 8 .' A passage vvas quoted by VVols in the preface to his first
vvatercolour exhibition. at the Galerie Kene Droııin in 19 45 :
‘Objects slıouldn’t touch. for they don’t livc. And yet they touclı 111e:
It’s unbearable. I’nı afraid of coming into coııtact vvith them/8
Sartre’s pre-vvar vvritings. published vvith often inappropriate
illustratioııs in Verve vvere transformed by their republication in the
1 940S vvith images by VVols. Even vvith tlıe biack and vvhite of fine
drypoint. VVols vvas able to convcy the hairs and the follicles. the
’rosy and porous’ matter of the human face as deseribed by Sartre.
Iııgrcs’s ‘Napoleon’. in Sartre's text of 19 3 9 . becomes for Wols the
sııbmerged memory of Georgc Grosz’s geııerals. apparcııt through
tlıc microbiological imagery etehed as the ‘Ofticial Portrait’ frontis­
piece - a rarc iııtimation of the political in VVols’s vvork (fig. 13).
VVhilst things. to quote Sartre. are but the ‘absürd thrust of
the ııearest masses . . . The Gaze. perceiviııg at a distance can nıake
the Universe appear . . . the meaning of a face is to be visible tran-
scendence. The rest is secondary: the abundance of flesh can paste
över that transcendeııce.’9
‘Food’, an extract from Sartre’s 19 3 6 novella Depaysemenl.
(Exile. Kstrangement) also published in Verve. reappeared vvith
unpublished extracts from Nausea and VVols’s illustrations in 1948.
thanks to the youııg publisher Jacques Damase. It vvas a plıilaıı-
thropic gesture by Sartre. but noııetheless created a conjunction of
text and iıııage that had very conlemporary resonances.10 VVhen
Sartre vvrote about VVols in 19 6 3 he rccalled VVols quotiııg to hira
1 35 1
P A R İS POST W A R

those same lines from Nausea: ‘Objects . . . touch me*. 'It hardly mat-
ters what these \vords mean here for ıııe'. Sartre said. *what he
means is that objects touch him hecause he is afraid of letting his
touch fail on them. They are him outside himself: to see them is to
dream h im self... he deciphers himself on the kııots of tree bark, in
the fissures of a vvall: roots. rootlets. vacuoles. pullulating viruses
under a microscope. tlıc hairy furrovvs of women and the turgid
flaccidness of male fungi compromise him . . . Inversely. vvith his
eyes slıut, \vithdravvn inside his night. he feels the ııniversal horror
of being-in-thc-vvorld . . . his automatism is only the fascinated
attention he has for his own products when they givc themselves to
him as external objects.’ 1 1 Before Sartre’s vvork on Giacometti. VVols
alrcady entbodied the perfcct 'existentia!lst' artist: ‘I met VVols in
’4 5. bald. vvith a bottle and a beggars' pouch. In the poııclı was the
\vorld. his worry. in the bottle his death . . . He had fevv projects: a
man \vho renevved himself non-stop. cternal in each instan t. . . in
fact I believe now that he had throvvn himself into one short-term
project, only one: to kili himself. convinced as he w as that there can
be no e.vpression vvithout self-destruction .'11 Sartre later confessed
that in his studies of painters and vvriters T ve alvvays looked for the
drinking or drug-takiııg aspects . . . vvhich are revealed in their
vvorks. I’ve alvvays been passionately keen to discover not the man
constructed via the vvork. but beyoııd that. the man vvho paints or
vvrites vvithout restraint.’ 1 * Such vvas VVols, vvho from his lırst
moments as a prisoner of vvar draıık to achieve the oblivion from
vvhich he drcvv - an experience quite distiııct from the ’automatist’
experiments o f the Surrcalists. VVols's organic. ‘inner’ abslraction.
vvhen expressed in oils for the first time in 1 9 4 7 (he had 110 prior
experience İ11 the medium) vvas a painting preciscly vvithout
restraint'. vvhere paiııt tricklings and surface scratches appeared
to relate directly to the Vision bchind tortured eyelids of a vvouııded
or bleeding body. Private unconstrained experience appears as
emblematic of the state of humanitv - microcosm equates vvith
macrocosm.14
Sartre’s first published post-vvar preface. hovvever. vvas linked
to sculptural prcoccupations of the past. despite the fact that the
vvorks in question vvere Alexander Calder's mobiles at the Galerie
Louis Carre in 19 4 b .1 ’ The shovv m ay be seeıı retrospectively as an
anticipation of kinetic art trends in the later 195OS. Sartre's text, in
many vvays so close to the Verve pieces. noııetheless eıılarges the
paraıııeters of his thoughts 011 sculpture: ‘YVith vile. inconsisteııt
substances. vvith tiny slivers of bone or tin or zinc he fashions
strange arrangements of stems and branches. of riııgs and featlıers
and petals. They are resonators or traps: the object is alvvays
nıidvvay betvveen the servility of statues and the iııdependence of
natural elcmcnts. It’s a little hot-jazz tune. unique. eplıemeral like
the skv. like the morning.’ 16 Sartre's conjunctions lıcre betvveen
musical improvisation. chaııce and freedom intercstingly anticlpate
Umberto Eco. vvho used Calder as the first of his artistic examples in
The Open Work.
VVhilst Calder vvas American aııd hardly an orthodox Bretonian
Sürrealist. Sartre’s diatribes agaiııst Surrcalism are a majör element
of Wlmt is Literatüre? of 19 4 7 . The International Hxhibition of Sürreal­
istti dominated critical and popular attention at the time. Tiııtoretto.
Lessing, Winckclmaıı. Venneer. Cezanne, Picasso's harlequins vvere
ali deployed by Sartre in a demoııstration of art’s relationship to
dominating povver struetures: these culminated. he said. in the
bourgeois stranglehold on literatüre in tlıc first lıalf of this century
in France. The Surrcalists. ‘revoltiııg agaiııst "leur papa’’, achieve
*
lig. 14 David Hare Man vvith a Urum 1947 Bronze Private Collection
the void through an over-fullness of being’ vvith a deluge of pur-
poseless objects and the philosophy of the booby-trap. Duchaıııp's
marble sugar cubes vvere the paradigm of futility. the Sürrealist life-
style a parade of had faith. Their advocacy of violence vvas ’illit-
erate*. Altlıough Sartre vvrote: 'vve have no vvish to “ engage”
painting. sculpture and music . . . at least not in the same vvay’, he
seemed. noııetheless. to see Surrealism as a mystification. just like
those he denounced later in the text: Nazism, Gaullism. Catlıoli-
cism. Conııııunism.
Hovv capricious then. of Sartre. to preface David Hare's exhibi-
tion of Sürrealist bronze sculpture vvhich vvas held at the Galerie
Maeglıt in December 19 4 7 - the very premises vvhere the Interna­
tional lixhibition of Surrealisın had been held in the suııımer. As usual
Sartre contemplated the paradox of liviııg and desiring matter
versus sculptural 'petrifactioıı'. but vvhile a sculpture by Praxiteles
or Donatello is complicit vvith our passioııs. iıe said. 'the sculpture
of Hare - like that of Giacometti - shovvs us man from the outside:
it attempts to dehumanise our gaze. like Kalka vvho sees (fail voir)
transcendence back to front’ (lig. 14). Not only does Hare introduce
movement into his vvorks like Calder. he elîects an etynıological
reversal: his gorilla bccoıııes ’horror vvhich gorillas’. Sartre also
cvokes the persoııal ('hodological') space arouııd a being vvhich
extends beyond its bouııdaries. anticipating his vvriting on Gia-
cometti.17 Sartre’s relationship vvith Andre Masson. vvhose vvork he
published in U s Teıtıps Modemes in 19 4 7 . vvas yet anot her frieııd-
ship vvith an erstvvhile Sürrealist.18 Giacometti had of coursc been
linked vvith the Sürrealist movement himself. but his refusal to con-
tinue vvith Sürrealist sculpture and a period of silence before a
retum to liguration (he had no public e.vlıibitioıı in Paris betvveen
19 3 5 and 19 5 1 ) demonstrated a persoııal integrity vvhich bound
him to Sartre from the spriııg of 1 9 4 1 . Sartre vvas attractcd to those
vvho had experienced extreme situations. in life or in aetion. that he
had not cxperienced himself. the precarious lives of Baudelaire.
VVols or Jean Genet are obvious examples. Altlıouglı Giacometti vvas
hardly a man of aetion. his vvitnessing, by absürd chanec. of a

[361

fig.ı5 Alberto Giacometti FallingMan T950-T Bronze Kunslhaııs, Zürich
Photograph by Hmcst Scheidegger from Jean Genet. L'Atelier d'Alberto
Giacometti. 1958
human death - a life and a look reverting to an absolutely lifeless
object - had been a crucial and formative expcriencc for the artist
in 1 9 2 1 . The ensuing sense of panic. the cxtension and elasticity of
space, as recounted by Giacometti in 19 4 6 . vvere elose to experi-
ences deseribed by Sartre.19 The tvvo men shared a proximity of
experience and vocabulary from the moment of their meeting,
vvhen Sartre vvas ıvriting Being and Notlıingness. Their earliest con-
versations are indicated. for examplc. by Sartre’s deseription in his
second Giacometti preface (19 5 4 ) of his ovvn feelings of agorapho-
bia 011 relcase from prisoner-of-vvar camp: 'So it is vvith Giacometti:
distance for him is not voluntary isolatioıı. nor is it reeoil.’20
Simone de Beauvoir quotes Giacometti in 1 9 4 1 : ‘A face. he told us,
vvas an indivisible vvhole. a mood. an expression. but the lifeless
material. marble. bronze. or plaster vvas inliııitely divisiblc. Every
partide stood apart. contradicted the vvhole and destroyed it. he
said.’ So elose to the Sartre of'Official Portraits’. Giacometti's vvords
here aııticipate Sartre’s later statements on Hare.21 And the iııflu-
ence vvas sıırely mutual: takc Sartre in Being and Nottlıingness. and
his discussion of vertigo: ‘Verttgo announces itself through fear:
I am on a narrovv path - vvithout a guard rail - vvhich goes aloııg
a precipice. The precipice presenls itself to me as to be avoided: it
represents a danger of death.’23 Giacometti's sculpture of 1 9 5 0 - 1 .
‘Falling M an’ (fig. ı 5) (in French UHoımne qııi clıavirc. vvhich iıııplies
vvavering, tottering) - is extraordinary as an idea of a ‘sculptural
situation’ and yet is precisely the embodiment of Sartre’s cliff-edge
experience in vvhich anguish and vertigo. self-consciousness and
the instinet for self-preservation play their part.2 * The solitariness of
Giacometti’s figures scems to embody vvhat Sartre in Being and Noth-
ingııess called the 'notlıingness' vvhich human reality carries 'vvithin
itself as the nothing vvhich separates its present from ali its past.’24
Sartre's discourse on the Other - sometimes simply aııother
being. sometimes specifically a vvoman (in the chapter 'Pattem s of
Bad Faith’ ) - can be seen to be expressed in Giacometti’s sculptures
P A R İ S P O S T VVAR
through the juxtaposition of figures. In 'City Squarc. Seven YVomen
and One Head’ 19 5 0 (Fondation Maeght. Saint-Paul). the gaze of
the nuıle büst represents desire. feelings of distance and sexual dif-
ference: the tali, full-length female figures stand vvith their backs to
him. Altem atively. separation from the Other can be expressed
through metaplıors of distance itself. vvhere perceptual size - the
trapezoid sculptural base for ‘Four Figürines 011 a Base’ 19 5 0
(n o .4 1) - can represeııt the recession of a stage and danciııg floor.2*
Just as Sartre's narrative 'cxcmplars' in Being and Notlıingness (see.
for example. the seetion on ‘The Caress’ in 'Concrete Kelations vvith
Othcrs’ ) link his philosophy vvith his novels. they provide philo­
sophical coordinates for situations. vvhich. remarkably. Giacometti
could envisage in sculptural terms.
The meeting of Sartre and Giacometti preceded full kııovvledge
in Paris of the concentratioıı camps. made painfully visible by the
sight of returning deportees. Yet vvhen Sartre came to vvrite the
preface for Giacometti’s first shovv at the Pierre Matisse Gallery in
19 4 8 . ‘The Search for the Absolute'. tvvo metaplıors vvere insistent
- metaplıors of the beginning and the eııd of history. The man of
Eyzies and the man of Altamira vvho preceded ‘tlıree tlıousand
years o f sculpture of the dead’ are contrasted vvith ‘tlıe fleshless
martyrs of Bucheııvvald . . . This martyr vvas only a woman. But a
vvoman complete. glimpsed. furtively desired.’26 These images of
begiıınings and of depouilîenıent (the strippiııg avvay of flesh and of
identity) confront a plctlıora of cultural references in Sartre’s pref­
ace of 19 4 8 : the paradoxes of Zeno. Dostoevsky. Katica - in particu­
lar Pascal, vvho offers a gloss on ‘for months [Giacometti] came and
vveııt vvith an abyss at his side’ .2"
Not before 1 9 5 0 vvould Sartre have encountered Martin Heideg-
ger’s essay of 19 3 6 , 'The Origin of the YVork of A rt’ vvith its famous
disquisition on Van Gogh’s pair of pcasanl shoes.28 Heidegger’s
notion of truth as alethcia (uııconcealment, diselosure) is developed
in the 19 3 6 essay. and becomes an important subtext in Sartre’s
second preface for Giacometti’s Galerie Maeght exlıibitioıı of 19 5 4 .
'Giacometti in Search of Space’.
So m any limpid ideas from Heidegger’s text elarify Sartre’s devel-
oping relationship to the vvork of art. Heidegger deciared: ‘The artist
is the origin of the vvork. The vvork is the origin of the artist. Neitlıer
is vvithout the other . . . If there occurs in the vvork a diselosure of a
particular being. diselosing vvhat and hovv it is. thcrı there is here
an occurring. a happeniııg of truth at vvork . . . To be a vvork means
to set up a vvorld . . . İn setting up a vvorld. the vvork sets forth the
carth.’29 Sartre’s vvriting and Giacometti’s post-vvar sculpture. a
majör historical conjunction. are illuminated by this carlier tcxt
vvhich confirmed the importance of the vvork of art as a philosophi­
cal poiııt of departurc.
The cncounter vvith Jean Geııet. vvhom Sartre had publicly sup-
ported since 19 4 7 . vvould coıııplicate the Sartre/Giacoıııetti rela­
tionship. indeed vvould set up a latently homoerotic triangle. While
Geııet had indeed lived through the extrcme situations that Sartre
could only dramatise. his life vvas ‘appropriated’ in the most astound-
ing vvay into Sartre’s vvriting vvith Saint Genel. Actor and Martyr.
scrialised from 19 5 0 in Les Temps Moderııes.30 Sartre propelled
Gcnet into the long encounter vvith Giacometti: Genct’s vvriting. not
Sartre’s. vvould preface Giacometti's third solo shovv at the Galerie
Maeght in Junc 19 5 7 . The three portraits in oils that Giacometti
made of Genet from 1 9 5 4 - 7 vvere an act of mutual recogniüon:
it has been implied that the tvvo ıııen’s attitude to horror. tlıc attrac-
tion of death and a sense of tragic solidarity betvveen beings vvas a
[371
1>ARIS P O S T VVAR

common bond vvhose intensity excluded Sartre (lig. 1 6). The İnsis-
tent phallic sexuality in the vvork of Genet and Giacometti. explicit
in Giacometti’s sculpture T h e Nose’ 19 4 7 (fig.17). and implicit in
tlıe mechanisms of the reciprocal gaze betvveen artist and model,
vvas another level at vvhich Sartre vvas potentially excluded - he
had been dravvıı by Giacometti betvveen 19 4 6 and 19 49 bespec-
tacled. his eyes dovvncast squintiug.1 1 Moreover the intensity of the
triangular relationship involving Giacometti affected both vvriters’
attitude to tiction. Sartre vvas to find in biography and his vvritings
on art a rclease from tlıe perils of lictitious political aetion:32 recip-
rocally. Genet, master of the disguised autobiography. found a
mode of truth-telling vvhich displaced the fictional in his text Alberto
Giacometti's Studio (19 5 8 ). Here he insisted on the paradoxes of
intersubjectivity, representation, ‘rescmblance’ and commemora-
tion implicit in the process of portraiture. Genet. the ’captive seribe’.
vvas depicted by Giacometti in the pose of an Kgyptian sculpture in
the Louvre - not merely a historical reference. but a play of the here
and novv vvith an immemorial humanity (see n o .6 1 ).33 Genet him­
self evokes the Osiris sculpture in the Louvre crypt as he thiııks of
Giacometti's ‘YVomen of Venice’ (nos.46-54). The hieratic immobi-
lity of the ‘YVomen of Venice' series fills him vvith terror and est-
rangement: they are both millenial and familiar. above ali ’a victory lig. 16 Alberto Giacometti Portrait of Jean
for bronze’ - yet a man on a train. the Street life of Paris, conversa- C.enct 1954 Crayon Photograph by Ernest
tions and memories of sexual encounters create a nevv decorum for Schcidegger froııı Jean Genet. L'Atelier d'AIlterto
Giacometti. 1958
the tcxt. Beyond Sartre’s philosophical and lime/spacc coordiııates
and his dream of the vaııished flesh of a martyred vvoman. Genet
insists upon the contingencies of life vvithin the absurdities o f ‘real
time’ and is explicit. for example, about the connection between
Giacometti’s female sculptures and the artist’s prostrate and
adoring behaviour in the brothel: ‘Betvveen each naked prostitute
and him. there vvas perhaps this distance vvhich ceaselessly estab-
lislıed itself betvveen each of his statues and ourselves. Each slatue
seemed to rcccdc - or come forvvard - in a night so distant and
dense that it mingles vvith death.'34 Genet establishes. against the
‘diselosure’ of Heidegger and Sartre. a different order of truth.
Ernest Scheldegger's photographs accompanied the publication
of Genet’s full-vcrsion text in 19 5 8 . Beyond the literary and
imaginative encounters of reader. vvriter and artist, the black and
vvhite images of Giacometti vvorking (lig.18). the disarray of sculp­
tures in the bare atelier. vvorks photographed in the Street, elose-ups
of paintings and dravvings. provided another rhythm and dimension
for Genet’s vvriting. Iıı Scheidegger’s elose-up photographs of spcc-
ific figüre paintings. likeness appcars through the proliferation of
precise contour marks. Cezanne’s intluence appears locked in a
struggle vvith Giacometti’s rage of liııes vvhich seem to seck their
ovvn obliteration. Perhaps the most striking images to accompany
Genet’s text vvere those of Giacometti's studio vvalls. flaking. pitted
and seratehed vvith grafiiti of the human form. ‘To be a vvork means
to set up a vvorld’ (see n o s.57-9 ). From the first marks of depiction
to the apex of representation: lıistory is collapsed in the extcnded
moment of the atelier.
Genet’s ‘takeover’ from Sartre in terms of Sartre’s art eriticisin
must be situated in terms of political crisis and Sartre’s alignment
vvith the French Communist Party in 19 5 2 . His ovvn party. the
R.D.P. (Rassemblemeııt Democratique Populaire) had iııitially pro-
posed mediation between the superpovvers. but Sartre’s change of
position became clear as instalmcnts of The Communists and Peace
vvere published in Les Temps Moderncs from 1 9 5 2 - 4 . Sartre’s about- lig. 17 Alberto Giacometti The Nose 1 947 Bronze Galerie
turn involved disturbing silences as regards both previous editorial Adrien Maeght. Paris

1381
 P A R İ S P OS T VVAR

exposes of Soviet labour camps. and the Communist Party position

on art - the strident Socialist Realism campaign. Howcver. the
repressive nature of French coloııia! policy at the time forced Sartre
to conclude that only from vvithin the Communist Party could
opposition have any effect.35 Sartre vvould continue to vvritc about
art. but the 'engagement' of a painter such as Robert Lapoujade
vvho combined a lyrical abstractionist technique and palette vvith
explicit political subject matter on tlıc Algerian VVar in 19 6 1 .
vividly demonstrates the aestlıetic problems posed by Sartre’s poli-
tics. This ‘other’ Sartre. this ‘other’ engagement in a time of politi­
cal crisis and coloııial vvar offers an explanation for Sartre’s
ostensibly inexplicable changes in artistic taste. The radical incom-
patibility betvveen his existentialist eriticisin and his subsequent
artistic parti pris accounts for the demişe of his plan for an Aesthelics.
in vvhich he had origiııally iııtended. like Heidegger. to republislı his
vvritings on art as part of his ovcrall philosophical project.*6

VII The Second Sex

One is not born. but rather becomes. a vvoman.

Simoııc de Beauvoir. 19 4 9 1
fig.ı 8 Giacometti at vvork Photograph by Ernest
. . . in a vvorld vvhere so many men are vvomen. she vvas a man!
Scheidegger. from Jean Genet, L'Atelier d'Alberto
Her vvork in its quantity, importance and grandcur manifests a Giacometti, 1958
male virtue.
Dor de la Souchere on Germaine Richier. 1966*

The movc from Sartre and Giacometti to the ‘problem of vvoman’ as

addressed in the post-vvar era involves a majör ehange of register.
Despite the enduring affinities betvveen Sartre and Simone de Beau­
voir. tlıe space and thoughts he shared vvith Giacometti and vvith
Genet vvould be distinctly separated from her domain and that of
the female characters in his successful plays.
To recall the vvar and its immediate afterhıath: the indomitable
femininity symbolised by the extravagant vvood-shaviııg and nevvs-
paper hats of the Occupation and the miniature couture manne-
quins of the recently rediscovered ‘Tlıeatrc of Fashion’ lıid the nıore
voracious passions of a period of deprivation. These vvere synı-
bolised by Picasso’s play of 19 4 t . Denire Caught by the Tail. per-
formed at a reading 011 19 March 19 4 4 vvith Sartre. de Beauvoir
and Camus aıııong the participants.* De Gaulle granted
Frenchvvomen the vote in October 19 4 5 . in recognition of their
indispensable role as vvorkers and often as Resistance-fighters
during the vvar. The recognition at this late date of women’s dignity
and equality vvithin the rubric of the French droils de Vhomnıe (rights
of man) ıııust be contrasted vvith the savage treatment of fenıale
'collaborators' during the epuration period. Paraded, shaved and
tarred. they vvere denounced by vvomen as viciously as by men.
This ritualised vcngeance was doııbtlcss the most ııaked expression
of France’s profoıuıd lıumiliation during the vvar. Appalling photo­
graphs reached America and vvere published in the Sürrealist
periodical View of 19 46 (fig. 19). Prinner's poem of February 19 4 5 .
’Tlıe Shaved YVoman' eclıoed the litany of iıısults: 'VVlıore! - Tart! -
Carcass! - Piece of slıit! - Disgustingl - Ixıok at lıer!' The shaved
fig. 19 Detail from View. no.6. 1946. p.9. from Jean
vvoman replies: ‘Remember. Hunıanity. that I anı your vvork. that
Eparvicr. A Paris soıts fa bolte nazie (n.d.) Photographs by
you have ıııade ıııe in your image.’ The poenı’s form, a tribunal Raymond Schall. Photographs of shaved and tattoocd
recalliııg the trial of Joan of Arc. expresses a sado-ıııasochistic ragc vvomen by Francis Lee

[391
P A R İ S P O S T W AR
lig.20 Hans Anton Prinncr The Shaved Woman
1 946 Drypoint Courtesy of Mme Anne Ferdlire
echoed by the artist’s stylised engraviııgs (fig.20).4 The thcnıe of the
shaved vvoman vvould iııspire the Marguerite Duras/Alaİn Kcsnais
coliaboration on the film Hiroshima mon amour (19 6 0 ). in vvhich the
coliective memories of such atrocities. and the desire to obliterate
them is seen to characterise the later 195OS.6
De Beauvoir's The Second Sex, serialised in Les Temps Modernes
from M ay 19 4 8 . and published in 19 4 9 . discussed in its contem-
porary seetions the tension betvveen vvomen’s ‘im age', herecono-
mic dependence on husband. lover. or pimp, and the struggles of
tlıe (barely) independent vvoman - vvhether seamstress. factory
vvorker or intelleetual. Despite the abolition of licensed brotlıels in
19 4 6 . French society stili functioııcd upon a sexual economy of
bourgeois m arriage together vvith the ‘seduetion’ of mistresses and
prostitutes. VVomen had been cnfranchlsed for only three years in
the France of 19 4 8 . and despite their role in the Resistance vvere
cxcluded from playing any part in national reconstruction.6
Momentarily. vvith this m assive vvork of schoiarship vvhich touched
upon history. aııthropology. psychoanaiysis and Marxist theory as
vvell as literary criticism. de Beauvoir - insulted by Camus. Merleau-
Ponty. François Mauriac. the Communists en bloc - stole tlıunder
from Sartre. The book vvas as thick a tome as Being and Notlıingness:
2 2 .0 0 0 eopies vvere sold in its first vvcek of publication. De Beauvoir
vvas specific in her redefinition of Sartre's fluctuatingly-sexed
‘Other’: ‘He is the Subject. he is the Absolute: she is the Other.’7
De Beauvoir's impact coincided vvith that of the Kinscy reports
on male and female sexuality in France (too clinical to have a majör
success) and the stirrings of a nevv sexual freedom expressed first
through popular song and stars like Juliette Greco and Catharinc
Savage. later through tlıe younger role modcls. Françoise Sağan in
literatüre. Brigitte Bardot in film.* De Beauvoir herself vvas vvise to
the povver of stereotypes: she interveııed. perhaps disappointingly.
in the very topical controversics about tlıc Marquis de Sade - much
loved by contemporary vvriters such as Bataille. Paulhan. Pierre
14° 1
Klossosvvki. the Surrcalists - and published Brigitte Bardot or the
Lolita Sgndroım' in 1 9 5 5 . VVhen suclı stereotypes vvere confronted
by the scandal of the rape and torture o f vvomen by French soldiers
during the Algerian War. she vvas again an important voice of pro-
test.9
While Giacometti m ay be seen to desiccate. to desexualisc his
bodies. paring his work dovvn to its minimal essencc and İts gaze.
for most post-vvar artists the geııre of the nııde vvas stili Central. The
age-old relationship betvveen the female body and painting - the
notions of beauty and ‘a rt’ - vvere specific targets. of course. for
Dubuffet. from his ‘Desnuda’ of 1 9 4 s (private collection), a refer-
ence to Goya. to ‘Olympia’ (fig. 12 ) in the ‘Corps des Damcs’ series
(see ‘Gymnosophie’. 110.20). This slıockingly caricatured Manet's
‘Olympia’. vvho had achicved her status as modernism's primary
icon vvhen the Impressİonist collectioııs from the Louvre vvere
iııstalled in the M useedu jeu de Paume in M ay 19 4 7 . Damcs vvere
not ladies. but prostitutes. so-called vvith the chivalry of those vvho
accepted the inevitability of the situation (6 0 0 .0 0 0 damcs vvere
vvorking in Paris in 19 4 8 . tvvo years after the official elosure of the
brotlıels).10 Dubuffet's ‘Olympia’ took her place next to other ladies
in his series such as ‘ Piece of Bulclıery' (Sidney fanis Gallery. Nevv
York). These are violent vvorks. despite their mock-iıısouciance.
Dubuffet. vvhile keepiııg his vvork in conıpletely traditional forıııats
and geııres (landscape. portraits - here the ııude) vvas attcmptiııg
another ‘anticultural' traıısformatioıı. The spreading and vvrinkled.
rosy images extend squarely. almost to the edges o f the canvas.
They correspond in their interiority and dissolutioıı not only to
Merleau-Ponty’s embodied cogito. but to an archetypal enunciation
by Sartre in 19 3 6 . in his chapter on the vvork of art in The Psyclıo-
h g y of the İmagination: ‘The real is never beautiful.’ To desire a
vvoman ‘vve ıııust forget that she is beautiful. becausc desire is a
plunge into the heart of existence. into vvhat is condngcnt and most
absürd.'1 1 Desire - or an infantile. aggrcssive rage - spreads out
contiguously vvith painterly matter. attempting to obliterate the
subject-ground relationship by eııgulfing it. The ugliness of these
Daıııes’ invokes vvith both hum our and terror the Devouring
Mother: Dubuffet’s ‘Damcs’ vvould be the mothers of Niki de Saiııt-
Phalle’s ‘N anas’ of the 1960S.
The Informel nudes of Dubuffet and Fautrier vvere presented as
absolutes 011 blank grouııds. YVhile ‘situational* rather than narra-
tivc. Jeaıı Helion’s paintings o f fleshy. ııaked vvomen - in groups. in
betvveen men. upside dovvn (viewed at the moment of departure ...)
covertly eıııphasised the transactionai ııaturc of the prostitute’s
role. The rhythm ical linkages of curves and cresceııts recall Helion’s
absrract painting of the past. vvhile dcpersoııalising the nudes as
individual ıııodels: they are not people but ’tokens of exchangc’
betwcen men: an indication of Helion’s reading of the contem­
porary vvritings of Levi-Strauss.11 Helion’s deliglıt in painting itself.
the rule-breaking of his figuration in the generally abstract and
Informel 195OS. his humour and irony in detail and handling.
create complex vvorks vvhose psydıological and painterly symme-
tries both invite and resist our dccodings.
Thus immemorial practice. balanced vvith contingency and
desire vvere fronted by a patriarchal political and intelleetual estab-
lishnıent. Sartre as both man and Logos vvas the most immediate
manifestation of this order for de Beauvoir. He penetrated her vvrit­
ing. it has been argued. vvith his ovvn horror o f ‘viscous’. feminine,
biological natu re.1 ’ Hovvever. *equality of achievem ent' vvas the
yardstick for the talented vvomen in the early 19 40S. for Simone

lig.2 1 Gcrmainc Richier Crucifi.v 19 50 Bronze
Church of Assy. liaıtte Savoie
fıg.22 Pablo Picasso Sktıll 1943 Bronze
\hıscc Picasso. Paris
P A R İ S P O S T WAR
VVeil as farmhand. Resistance-vvorker and religious m ystic.14 de
Beauvoir in her novels. travelogues. seholarship. for Gemıaine
Richier in sculpture. Richier frequented the cafes of Monlparııasse
in the company of figures such as Colette, Nathalie Sarraute and
other figures around the prestigious Nouvelle Revıte Française group.
such as Dominiıjue Aury. VVhile Aury. in her picaresquc. nco-
Sadian novel Story of O buried her identity and paradoxically her
sex vvith the pseudonym Pauline Reage (linked iııstantly to her
companion, Paulhan), complicitly adopting Sadean stereotypes.
Richier’s sexuality in conjunction vvith her vvork challengcd and
disturbed eonventional notions. The poet. Rene de Solier. \vrote in
the special ııumber of 19 4 8 Derriere le Miroir vvhich accompanied
Richier’s shovv at the Galerie Maeght: *1 dare not pronouııce the
vvord "virility" as regards her vvork. although that’s the most
appropriate term.' 'Le sculpteur*. Tartiste’ (masculine nouns) - and
Richier's ‘unfeminine’ vvorking ski-outlit - are balanced agaiııst
'this universe. vvhere vvoman is sovereign, vvhich returns to origins*
a clear case of confusion surrounding the classical dichotomy: male
creativity versus female nature.15 Andre Pierre de Mandiargues, the
Provence-based. Surrealisl-affiliated vvriter and follovver of the Mar-
quis de Sade, uscd sadism as a metaphor for Richier the sculptor.
vvho kneads, tvvists. breaks. pokes and seratehes prior to the
'orgasm* of consummation betvveen artist and sculpture as the
vvork is deemed finished. İle invoked Otto YVeiniger’s theories of the
sadist vvho ornaments and then strips sculptures to humiliate them
- but then hasteııed to make a compeıısatory statemeııt: T ve never
knovvıı a vvoman so good. so discrcct. full of spiritual bounty. a
force of nature’. 16
Richier’s lack of the reputation she deserves beyond France
(although complicated by litigation after her death) is not uncon-
nected vvith the ambiguous reactions her oeuvre provoked in critics.
İn contrast to Giacometti. vvhose vvorks vvere not shovvıı to a French
public uııtil 1 9 5 1 . Richier had become. by 19 5 0 . the focus of
national controversy vvith her scarred, eroded crucifix for the
church of Assy (fig.21). A comparison of the exlıibiting lıistory of
the tvvo artists from 1 9 3 5 - 5 5 vvould establislı Richier’s greater con-
temporary reputation vvithout doubt. İ ler vvork never became a
commodity. a matter for financial speculation. To vvhat extent vvas
the contrary true of Giacometti. precisely because of the myth-
making proccss vvhich vvould link him so iııextricably vvith the
existentialist vvritings of Sartre? The fact that. unlike Giacometti.
Richier’s vvork had an immediate posterity in the Sclıool of Loııdoıı
sculptors. and in the vvork of Cesar in France. bears a more
eloquent vvitness to her fecuııdity than any uııcomfortable contem-
porary praise.
Giacometti’s art originatiııg in Surrealism. vvas poised in the
1940S betvveen the tragedy of the existential predicamcnt and a
sophisticated. urban absürd. Richier’s came from a pure lineage of
monumental sculpture directly affiliated to Auguste Rodin and
Emile Bourdelle. in her case modilied through her anti-Parisiaıı.
Provençal. background. The most povverful and fleslıy of Richier’s
male figures. ’Storm M an’ 19 4 8 (110.96), used the very model, novv
an old ıııan. Nardoııe. vvho had posed in his youth for Rodin’s nüde
‘Balzac’ ( 18 9 6 - 8 ) - the very paradigm of male poteney and
creativity. Just as Richier vvould vvork vvith Rodin’s models. she
ıvorked vvith his foundries. Rodicr. Valsuani and Süsse, and
embraced both the hard physical labour and the Vulcanic imagery
of vvorker vvith metal and fire. YVhile the im agery of death in
Giacometti’s emaciated figures vvas perhaps starker than Richier’s.
[4 1 1
P A R İ S P O S T VVAR

Richier’s. her relationship to the male and female body and issues of
sexuality and death is equally fascinating.,r Picasso’s bronze ’Skull’
19 4 3 (lig.22) and his ‘Man vvith a I.amb' 19 4 4 (Musee Picasso.
Paris) are key sculptııres of the early post-vvar period. as are Fau­
trier’s scratched and scored ‘Otage’ pieces in bronze (see n o s.2 2-5).
but is it not perhaps to Richier. rather than Giacometti. that the tra­
dition of post-vvar sculpture ovves its characteristically ‘brutallsed’
surfaces. along vvith the configurations that vvould be baptised in
Britain the ’Geometry of Fear’? Her scarifıed surfaces and the death-
like ugliııess of some o f her female creations countered notions of
sculptural beauty vvith intimations ofdeformity and mutilation. Yet
a uııifying totality. in tension vvith a totalisiııg sense of desire in her
vvork. conformed perfectlv to Sartre's later definition of the Beauti-
ful.18 She created explicit metaplıors of nature’s physical invasion
of sculpture: in ’Forest Man* 19 4 6 (no.95). a disturbing metamor-
phosis occurs: Richier cast found tvvigs and braııches as arms and
limbs: leaves vvere pressed into the vvet elay to leave their silhou-
ettes prior to casting. Nature invaded the ıııonument - and the
monument vvould find its home in nature. leaving Giacometti's city
squarc. 'The Preying Mantis’ 19 4 6 . represents. upriglıl and death-
like. the İnsect celebrated by the Surrcalists as a token of female
sexual povver: she devours the male after copulation. Figures such
lig.2 3 Niki de Saint Phalle Crucifixion 19 63 Mixcd media assemblage
as ‘Tlıe Ant' 19 5 3 (Staatsgalcrie Moderner Kuııst. Munich). evoke Musee National d’Arı Moderne. Centre Georges Pompldou. Paris
both creativity and entrapment vvith their vveb-like imagery -
ambivalently alw ays. as the spinner. one of the three Fates is a pri-
meval image of female povver. In the aftermath of the death camps
and Hiroslıima. the idea of a rcversal ofevolııtion. the degenerating cxcess of femininity expresscd anxieties that the Surrcalists vvere
of the human through mammal and bat to bird and insect forms soon to sense: long after Duclıaıııp’s ‘Pleasc Touch’. rubber breast
vvas a povverful metaphor in Richier’s vvork. not only of nature. but on the cover of the catalogııe for the International Sürrealist Exhibi-
of regression to a more bestial uııiverse. tion of 19 4 7 . Man Ray. in an exasperated expose. contrasted the
İt vvas this element of regression and decay vvhich caused fear dark existentialist vvaif (Juliette Greco) vvith the bloııdc Marilyn in
aııd repulsion in Richier’s crudfix for the church of Assy in 19 5 0 . 19 5 8 . quotiııg Christian Dior*s lipstick adverts and Jean Paulhan’s
On a poetic and etymological level. the fıısion of body and bark in preface to the Story of 0 : 'ali is sex in them [womeıı] even the spiril.
Richier’s crucilix evoked the metamorphosis of event to symbol. They must be continually fed. vvashed. painted vvith ıııake-up and
A speetrum of modern artists vvere involved vvith the Assy project. beaten.'ao The ııext International Sürrealist Exhibitlon. EROS of t 9 59.
Yet Fernand Ieger's magnificent nıosaic portals vvere dubbed a bla- vvould signal both an apotheosis of these attitudes and a more
sphemy: Richier’s crucifix caused a riot. The so-called Angers tract. avvare exploration of social and anthropological issues.
entitled ‘God Shall not thus be Mocked’ vvas issued by the right- Was de Beauvoir's battle conıpletely lost? The clıallenge of popu­
vving Integrists. It juxtaposed Richier’s vvork vvith a typical head lar culture had to be confronted before her message could be reacti-
of Clırist. vvith the captioıı ‘The Face of Christ? No! A Scandal for vated nıore positively in the early 1 960S. Sigııificaııtly. it vvas not
Christian Piety.’ The vvork vvas firıally reıııoved by the Bishop of Gemıaine Richier’s aspiratioıı. her aflıliations vvith past masters.
Annecy. The Vatican attacked in 1 9 5 ı . 19 After the Assy scandal. her rigorous training or her travail vvith bronze that could point a
Richier continued to vvork and exhibit during tlıc 195OS. In con- vvay forvvard to other vvomen artists. Margiııal sources. bricolage
trast vvith the spikiness of the insect vvomen certaiıı vvorks achieved teclıniques. the impact of Dubuffet and an eııcounter betvveen
a solemıı and monumental dignitv. They remained deeply rootcd in Duchamp's ready-mades and her children’s toys vvould generale
Riclıier’s n a tive Proveııce. using objects found on tlıc land and the Niki de Saint Plıalle’s monumental sculptures of the 1 960S. Yet de
sea-slıore: ‘The Slıepherd of Laııdes' 1 9 5 1 (no. 10 0 ) has his face Saint Plıalle’s 'Crucifixion' 19 6 3 (tig.23). her altarpieces and the
made from a brick pierced and rubbed smooth by the sea. Richier's political ‘surface’ of her vvorks situate her surprisiııgly. but convinc-
collaborations. in particular vvith Maria Heleııa Vieira da Silva. the ingly as Richier’s successor.-51 Her status tlıroughout the 1960S
most important vvoman palnter in the Sclıool of Paris, gave her vvas just as unusual as Richier’s during tlıc previous decade.
vvork a nevv dimension. in vvhich the ııotioıı o f sculptural patiııa For sociological reasons - and purely fiııancial oııcs - vvomens’
and base extended to embrace a painted enamel background. real povver in the post-vvar Paris art vvorld vvas as gallery ovvncrs.
The avvkvvard. scratched surfaces of Richier’s ‘ Diabolo’ (no.99). caring for and proıııoting their artists: jcaııne Castel. Fautrier’s
the Informel nudes - Fautrier’s scarred and iridescent 'Sarah'(no.26) patron in the 193OS continued after the vvar: Jeanne Bucher died
or Dubuffet’s ‘Olympia’ (Hg. 12 on p.34) - must read ‘agaiııst’ the Lragically in 19 4 6 . but her gallery has faithfully promoted Dubuffet;
frou-frou of the Nevv Ix>ok. the ‘Miss Tabou’ beauty contest in Saint- Colette Allendy would pioneer Dada. ııeo-Dada and Informel exlıibi-
Germain-des Pres, the historical costume dramas in the theatres tions from her lıouse in the 1 6th arondissement: Nina Dausset pro­
and the cincma. the taste for a ’fantastic forlies'. ali of vvhich played moted the Surrealists. iris Clert the Nouveaux Realistes. Denişe
their role in charactcrisiııg the rebom femme française. A certain Rentf vvhose first exlıibitioıı vvas held in 19 4 4 contiııues. magnifi-

[4^1
 P A R İ S P O S T VVAR

cently. to proınote her changing stable of geometric abstract and

kinetic artists. Betty Friedan’s The Teminine Mgstigue ( 1 96 3) took up
the torch from de Beauvoir in Les Tenıps Modernes in summer 19 64 :
The Second Sex vvas subjected to a sharp feminist analysis in 19 6 9 .- '
Yet the grip of the status quo - particularly in conservative, esseıı- ANDRli MAI.RAUX

tially Catholic countries like France - is tlıe reasoıı vvlıy de Bcau-

PSYCHOl.OGIE DE L’ART
voir’s account of the ‘Second Sex’ has hardly dated. Marguerite
Duras became the first vvoman member of the Academie Française
in 19 8 0 - six years before de Beauvoir’s death.

VIII The Imaginary Museum

The role of mııseums in our relationship vvith art vvorks is so

great that vve can scarcely imagine that there are none. none
vvill ever exist vvhere modem Buropean civilisation rests
unknovvn . . . They are but a tvvo-centuries old inveııtioıı. The L E MUSEE İMAGİNAİRE
nineteeııth century lived from them. We livc from them stili.
Andre Malraux. r 9 4 7 ‘

The nevv and very 'masculine' art produced in the immediate post-
vvar period vvas lighting against tvvo paradigms: that of ‘art’ in the
sense of the art of the museums as represented by the Louvre and
that of the ‘tradition of modemism*. as establishcd prior to 1 9 3 9
and exhibited at the Musee national d’art moderne and other
fig.24 Andre Malraux. U’ Musee imaginaire 1947.
venues during the period.* Andre M alraux’s infiuential conccpt of cover
the Musee imaginaire (imaginary museum) aııd its relationship to
the art of the Louvre slıould be seen as complicating the impasse
of late modemism. Informel painting and the brüt art of an Artaud
ovved their ‘originality’. their evocation of origins. precisely to their
by-passing of the.se tvvo discourses. each of vvhich vvas cııtram-
melled in specific appurtenances of povver. As M alraux himself com-
mented: ‘Europeaıı art is not a heritage but a system of vvill and
Furope vvill not remaiıı a heritage but a system of vvill or death.’ 1
The Musee imaginaire contemplates the status of the art vvork
and the museum in the age of plıotographic reproduetion and
cinema. It cxults in the ‘extreme intellectualisation’ nevvly offered
to art history as a comparative discipline (thanks to plıotograplıy)
vvhile dematerialising the art vvork and its ‘real’ presence. VValtcr
Benjamin vvas not the only - and most obvious - source for this
lıuge cultural enterprise. The comparative techııique used in the
Iilaue Reiter Almanach as early as 1 9 1 2 vvas brought home to Mal-
raux by an encounter vvith the Cologne-based art historian Andre
Salm ony in the early 1 920S. Hqually important vvere M alraux’s
thoughts on contemporary German and Soviet film, vvhich intensi-
fied after meeting Sergei Eisenstein in the Soviet Union in 1 934.
vvhen a complete shooting seript for his anti-imperialist novel.
Man's Tate vvas made - and lost. The theme of persoııal versus his-
torical destiny. the relationship betvveen epic historical and cultural
themes and cinem a’s penetration of the ıııasses. the implications of
elose-up. montage. travelling. vvere tlıcre before Malraux read Ben-
jam in’s novv celebrated essay. ‘The VVork of Art in the Age of Meclı-
aııical Reproduetion’ published in Paris in 1 9 3 6 . 4 The conccpt of
the Musee imaginaire vvas formed in the late 1 930S in tandem vvith
M alraux’s ovvn expericnce as a film direetor. and the lıappy coinci-
deııce of the publication by the Louvre of the Plıotographic Encgclo-
pedia o f Art.* Four articles by M alraux in Verve from 1 9 3 7 - 4 0 fig. 2 s Andre Malraux choosing photographs for the Voices of
vvould herald the seminal publications of 1 9 4 6 - 5 0 : Sketchfora Psg- Silence c. 19 50 Photograph by Maurice Jarnoux for Paris-Match

f43]
P A R İ S P O S T \ VAR

chology o/Ciııema (19 4 6 ). and the three volumes that coııstitutcd his
Psychology of Art. i r Musee imaginaire vvas tlıe first of these. appear-
ing in 19 4 7 .6 The t\vin estrangements effected upon tlıe art vvork.
first its removal from its contcxt to the museum. a space for the
'confrontation of metamorphoses'. secoııdly its dematerialisation
through photography. losing colour, scale. texture and presence
correspond not merely to Benjaınin's lamentatioıı for the 'loss of
a u ra’ but engender an exultation at the possession o f ‘tlıe first uııi-
versal artistic culture. vvhich doubtless vvill transform modern art
. . . 011e of the supreme conquests of the VVest.’7 In the Musee
imaginaire. humanism iscoııfronted vvith a painful avvareness of a
eyelieal history. in vvhich the passage of a smile from a Khmer
Buddlıa to the angel of Reims cathedral transceııds millions of
deaths. The origins of M alraux’s museum lie in booty and pillage:
knowledge, too. is presented in terms of conquest. İn the last «4.
volüme, the analogy betvveen art and a sccular religion is made •A y a {fO. tİL lA-
explicit: T h is art is not a god. it is an absolute; but this absolute
vvhich has its fanatics and its martyrs is not an abstraetion . . .
Modern Art. vvhich no longer knovvs vvhat could be an exenıplary
ideal of man often suggests to us an cxcmplary ideal of the artist.*8
VVhile in contemporary terms M alraux reaches Cezanne and m
Kouault (vvith a nod at Braque). Picasso becomes the sigıı of the
lig.26 Andre* Malraux Art C’ritic Dcvil (n.d.) Courtesg Mine
artist vvho has appropriated the Musee imaginaire in his diversity of Modelcine Malraııx. Paris
siyle, and vvhose is consciously creatiııg his ovvn posterity: ‘Picasso
is painting his complete vvorks.*0 M alraux’s delirium of verbal and
pictorial juxtapositions deliberately mimics a range ofcinem atic
devices. orchestratiııg his theory that the plıotographic 'museum
of reproduetions allovvs a style to come alive just as accelerated film not an empirical history of art:'tlıe vvords conquest. annexatioıı.
can shovv a plant blooming.’ The art vvork as photograph becomes possession reverberate iııccssantly in the Voices of Silence like so
an ‘instant of art*, like a film celi.10 m any elarion calls*. Georges Duthuit protested in his three-voluıne
M alraux's novels and editorials in the late i9 2 0 s and the 1 930S riposte. Le Musee inimaginahle (The Unimaginable Museum) of
vvere those of a virulent anti-colonialist.1 1 His vision had been 1 9 5 6 .14
created by tlıe East: extensive travels in his youth were intimately In 19 4 7 . M alraux. the despairing hümanist of the Mıısee
linked to self-kııovvledge via the same comparative method he imaginaire asked: VVhat nineteentlı ceııtury state vvould have dared
applied to vvorks of art: he savv the artistic roots of Christendom to employ torture?’ Yet in 19 58. as Minlster of Culture for the Fiftlı
itself in the East's assault 011 Kome. The povverful Idea of the Musee Republic. M alraux vvas finally forced to take his staııd against the
imaginaire had initially been democratic. linked vvith Popular Front government. against torture as practiced by the French State in the
ideas of art *s vvidest possible audicııce at a time vvhen M a!raux vvas context of the Algeriaıı War - no longer the practice of the barbar-
elose to the Communist left.w As Malraux began to play an impor­ ous Other. but that of France h erself.'5 YVhile never vvavering in his
tant but increaslngly conservative role in the political life of post- allegiance to de Gaullc. M alraux‘s subsequent career as Miııister of
vvar France. he became increasingly elitist: so. as a corollary. did his Culture during this later period vvhich signalled France’s loss of
belief İn the autonoıııy of the art vvork and its development. He pos- political and cultural povver. continued to demonstrate a conflict
ited a history of style iııdepcndent of positivist and determinist betvveen self and other. elitism and populism that had been
accounts or the social considerations offered by Taiııe. Hegel. Marx rehearsed in the subtextual confrontation betvveen higlı art and
or contemporary Communist critics. The Musee imaginaire became cinema in his Psychology of Art series.
an ever-enlargiııg proposition. dotted vvith the names of great VVhere vvas the space here for the contemporary artists Malraux
artists and illustrated vvith vvorld masterpieces. yet ultimately a dis- collectcd? hı particular Fautrier vvhose vvorks he had promoted
play of M alraux’s ovvn metamorphoses and the mastery of his ovvn since the 19 20 S . vvhose 'Otages* series he had prefaced in 19 4 5 .
style. *5 its popularising role and the qualily of reproduetions noııe- calliııg the vvorks ‘hieroglyplıs of pain?’ 16 M alraux‘s penehant for
tlıeless had an iııestimable inıpact. not the least in providing artists the fragıııent. the patina. the imperfect vvas glossed by his adversary
vvith a repertory of primitive French, Kastem and pre-Rcnaissance Georges Duthuit: ‘tlıe vvhole body is the body vvhich escapes you*.
forms as vvell as vvorks from the Louvre. vvhile the scar vvas the 'sign of possession *.‘ 7 M alraux slıoııld be
As Miııister of Information in de Gaulle’s 1 9 4 5 - 6 governıııent linked to Fautrier. his artist, the painter and sculptor of the scar and
M alraux vvitnessed Fraııce’s cxpulsion from Indoclıina by tlıe jap- tlıc vvouııd: both created bodies of vvork rlven vvith poteııtial loss.18
anese in March 19 4 5 . a situation abruptly altered by the atomic
bombs dropped on Hiroslıima. French administration vvas re-
established. but insurreetion in Vietnam led iııeluctably to the start
of the hıdochinese vvar. In an era marked by France’s ignominious
end as a colonial povver. M alraux's vvas. iroııically. an imperialist.

1441

IX The Open Work
Time, like Nature. proceeding only in leaps. means that life is
only a succession of presents. Historical speculations about tlıe
pnst and philosophical ones about the future are sterile and arti-
ficial. T.et us plıınge. perpetually into the presenf.
Michel Tapie, 19 4 8 '
That the Informel is a conccpt dialectically related to M alraux‘s
imaginary museum is without doubt a point anticipated by the
cultural antitheses set up by Michel Tapie in his Mirabolus. Macadam
et Cie preface of 19 4 6 . but elaborated explicitly. after M alraııx’s
19 4 7 publication. in Tapie’s coııtribution to the catalogııe
of H.W.P.S.M.T.B. (Hartııng. VVols. Pieabia, Stahly. Mathieu. Tapie.
Bryen) held at the (îalerie Colette Allendy in April 19 4 8 : ’lt’s of no
interest to me ıvhatsoever to knovv whether Bernini’s .Saint Teresa
is bettcr than the Damc de Lespugue or not so good as the Callipy-
gian Venüs or better than Pilippino’s Magdalene or not so good as
Ruben’s ladies or not so better as La Goulue or even better than
the Mona Lisa or not so good as Duchamp’s Bride.’4 The collapsed
notion of time here, parodying M alraux’s page layout and his ram-
paging style m ay be contrasted with Tapid’s exhortation to plunge
into the present - a Bcrgsonian duree.
The notion of the Informel as preseni and timeless coincides vvith
a presentiment of the era as represcntativc of Hegel’s 'end of his­
tory' - a point that vvould be made explicitly by Paulhan3 - yet the
very fact that Fautrier’s vvork is riclı vvith references to the many-
breasted Dam ede Lespuge, France’s most revered prehistoric Venüs
ligure. that Paulhan could read Rembrandt, Soutine and Turner in
Fautrier’s pâte contradicts the notions of timelessness in his vvork -
or rathcr envisagcs time itself as a simultaneous coexistence of ali
moments of history.4
While the relationship betvveen Fautrier and the vvriter Georges
Bataille vvas profound in the 1 940S. 110 use of Bataille’s term informe
of the 1 920S as a specific concept ever appeared in conjunction
vvith the substaııtive Informel.s Informe vvas o f course a common
adjective. The critic Waldemar George called the Otages exhibition
‘a triumph of the formless’ linking the vvorks to the failed 'master-
piece’. a mere scribble of lines, ofBalzac’s painter l;renhofer.<> After
his ‘Otage’ paintings and sculpturcs Fautrier himself vvas almost
silent until his shovv of'Object' paintings of 19 5 5 - except as
illustrator for Bataille's Allehıiah (19 4 7 ) and Andre Frenaud’s
superbly erotic illustrated book The Wonıan of mu Life (19 4 8 .
fig.27).7 But iııforme appears again in 19 4 5 in Dubuffet’s ‘Notes for
the VVell-Read'. vvritten to explain his vvork to vvriter friends in the
spring and sunımer of 19 4 5 : 'Beginning vvith the formless: the
bcginnings of the adventure are the surface vvhich vvill coıııe to life
and the first spot of colour or ink throvvn 011 to it.’8 İn 1 947. he
judged 'the most summ ary. the most informe portrait'. superior to
‘tlıe most vvorked-over portrait in the vvorld’.4}
The Informel grouııd vvith its trickliııg signs ncxt came to be seeıı
as a ııeo-Dadaistic chaos in the vvorks of Wols or of Camitle Bryen
for exaıııple: the Dada preccdcnt vvas Central to Bryen. vvhose phi­
losophy of abhumaııisnıe interpreted the Informel as imagery of life at
a visual microlevel.10 In the preface to the Wlıite and Black cxhibi-
tion at the Galerie des Deux-Iles in July 19 4 8 . vvhere Fautrier joined
Arp. Bryen. Germain. Hartung. Mathieu. Pieabia. Ubac. VVols. and
Tapie himself. Tapie proelaimed: 'the Incoherent and tlıe informe. set
free at last are prevailing in ali paintings. for they alone possess the
P A R İ S P O S T WAR
fig.27 Jean Fautrier. iilustration for l.a Femme de ma vie 1948 Lithograph
only magico-pysclıic force that is actually real: Inertia.' Already he
had moved on from references to Far Eastern music and hot-jazz to
a coıısideratioıı of tlıe implications of entropy tlıeorv: the intluence
of the Romaııian eıııigre matlıematician. Stephane Lupasco 011 the
vvritings of both Tapie and Georges Mathieu vvould become inereas-
ingly insistent.1 1 With Vehemences Confrontees (Opposing Forces) at
the Galerie Niııa Daussct in Marclı 1 9 5 1 . vvhere. for the first time
the vvorks of American artists confronted the Informel school of
Paris. Tapie’s preamble introduced the metaplıors of the coııquista-
dor. the epic, the perilous routes and arduous adventures of the
‘indefinite doıııain of the Informel'. Saint John of the Cross. Nietzsche
and the Dada manifestos vvere the talismen he claimed. for this
period of the ‘end of the end of the History of A rt’. The figurative/
non-figurative debates of tlıc 1 940S vvere grandly dismissed: th e
•V D V F N T l'R F IS E l.S F A V H F .R F . A N D O T H E R .’ 12
Obviously Tapie’s ovvn promotioııal stable linked to the Nevv-
York affiliated Studio Fachetti gallery vvas iııvolved in these
broadening definitions, that after Vehemences Confrontees. iııclude
the eclectic seleetion seen in the shovv conımemorated in Tapie’s
publication Un art antre of 1 9 5 2 . '3 Tapie’s constant emplıasis 011
the ‘virility’ of the Informel m ay be seen as an overeompensation for
the evidently female connotations of primordial matter and the
incisive. penetrating. mark-makiııg relationship it posiled vvith the
artist. Sexual ambiguitites vvere strikiııgly evideııt in the preface for
Jackson Pollock’s first one-maıı shovv in Paris in February 19 5 2 .
Tapie used the aııarclıist image of a bomb for this 'departure from
zero'. 'Violence becomes Painting’ he dcclarcd - but apropos of Pol­
lock’s 'She YVolf 19 4 3 (The Museum of Modern Art. Nevv Y o rk )-
’tlıanks to reproduetions. the best-knovvn vvork in Europe’ . VVitlı the
anim al’s robustly handled fine of full teats it vvas not only a povver-
ful image of female fecundity but of course a syıııbol of beginnings
of Roman civilisation - neitlıer a bomb nor a ‘zero’. 14 This exercise
of a ‘male’ povver in turu came to be associated vvith the
‘inhum an'/'antihum anist’ characteristics of tlıe Informel: as Tapie
vvould later summarise: 'The destruction/creation of Dada strikes a
harnıoııic clıord vvith Nietzsche’s Will to Power: ali humanism liqui-
dated.'
Iıı 19 6 0 . Tapie established the International Ceııtre of Aesthetic
Research in Turiıı. pronıotiııg his ovvn ideas and publications and
international contacts.15 Umberto Eco’s first tlıoughts upon a
painterly Informel appeared subsequently in 1 9 6 1 : in The Open Work
in the Visual Arts (19 6 2 ). he vvould expand the definition of the
f 451
P A R İ S P O S T VVAR
Informel to tlıc broadest possible rubric. sinnıltaneously opening up
the conccpt to scienttfic and musical theories and distancing it from
its once-promoted connections with past art and art history, stili
present in the interprctatioııs of Jean Paulhan's İn Praise of the
Informel of 1 9 6 2 . '6
Coneurrently with its grovving inlluence över Europe. and its
embrace of American painting. the Informel (vvith Tapie's enthusi-
astic aid) reached Japan. Just as Tapie vvith Dubuffet had formulated
the premises of a nevv or ‘other’ primitivism in the 1940S. so this
turııing of the Informel tovvards Japan can be seen to signal a nevv
Orientalism. Orientalism had of course been implicit in the very
origins of Henri M ichaux's taches - his experience of the Far Rast fills
A Barbarian in Asia, t 9 3 3 . a disguiscd autobiograplıy comparable to
M alraux’s Orientalist Temptation o f the West (19 2 8 ): ‘Objects are
traced. they seem like mcmories . . . The Chinaman possesses the
faculty of reduciııg Being to Being signified.’ 17 In M ichaux's vvorks.
the VVesterıı inheritaııce - Victor Hugo’s ink blots. Sürrealist auto-
matism and ink decalcomanias. the Rorschach test - a craze in the
19 40S Saint-Germain-des-Pres - struggles vvith the East.18
M ichaux’s evocations of ‘another place’. ‘other beings’, his signs of
‘other beings’ in ‘otlıer spaces’, the metaplıors of exorcism. the ıııys-
teries of sepia. correspond in his ovvn vvay to Tapie’s antre. The
motility of the sign and its phenomenology vvas also important:
I vvanted to dravv the consciousness of being and the flux of time'
M ichaux vvould say in the 19 5 0 S . 19
The Orient vvould also be a majör point of reference for the
’siting’ of the vvork of Pollock in Paris in 19 5 2 : ‘America has
become the aetual geographic crossroads for the confrontation of
the great artistic currents of the Orient and the West.*2° The inllu­
ence of Japan on the School of Paris itself vvas felt beyond the field of
art antre: Hans Hartung and Georges Mathieu forcefully exemplified
its impact in terms of gestural abstraetion.21 The Orientalism of
some Informel painting vvould entice the second generation of post-
lig.28 Jean Dubuffet Portrait of Michel Tapie August i946(îouache
Private Collection
[461
vvar Surrealists like Iaroslav Serpaıı and Jean Degottcx into its
embrace. ‘The Second Japanese Mode’ merited a vvhole chapter in
Painting Today (19 5 9 ). a popularising ovcrvievv of art in France by
the vvell-known critic. Michel Kagoıı. VVhilc M alraux’s Musee
imaginaire and Franco-Japânese exclıanges dominate the very first
page of Ragon’s preface. contemporary American competitioıı is
dismissed in a phrase.22 Tapie’s trips to Japan. vvhere in 19 6 r. Fau­
trier vvon the painting prize at the seventh Tokyo Biennale. the
exchaııgcs he set up for Japanese artists in Paris and in Turin, Geor­
ges Mathieu’s Japanese exhibitioııs and inlluence demonstrate the
pııll of this alternativc Francc/Italy/Japan axis. The intelleetual
excitcment in Europe signified by the iııterdisciplinary aspects of the
vvritings of Tapie on the Informel. taken up by Eco in The Open Work.
together vvith these exchanges with the Rast should counteract
over-emphasis on the 19 50S as a Franco-Am erican struggle, essen-
tially a question of ‘Hot Paint for Cold W ar’.2 *
X The Return of the Repressed: Revisioning
Paris Post War
‘Reconstructing modernisin’ has recently become a tag vvhich takes
on the Cold VVar problem and art/politics issues. but has been both
unclear as regards specifics, and unvvilling to embrace vvithin its
ovvn criteria the ideologies implicit in Michel Tapie’s art antre, an art
defined by its otherness and difference. its cxisteııtial affiliations and
its later geographical perspeetives involving Europe as a vvhole and
Ja p a n .1 This art. vvhich savv itself as m arkiııg a specific cultural
break vvith the art of the past (ineluding the ‘tradition of modern­
isin’ ) vvas of course outside tlıc museum - yet paradoxical!y con­
temporary vvitlı Andre M alraux's concept of the Musee imaginaire
and the late modemism promoted by Jean Cassou. direetor of the
Musee national d’art modeme in Paris throughout tlıc post-vvar
period.
Challenging the art of the nevv museum together vvith the art of
the Louvre. the nevv art antre vvas sufficiently flexiblc to revvrite a
relationship vvith a ‘differeııt' primitivism. and a ‘different’ Orien­
talism in a period in vvhich savv France’s collapse as a coloııial pres­
ence in Indochina and Korea. Of course in the vvakc of the MarshalI
Plan for reconstructiou. American culture vvas both celebrated and
perceived as a threat. Scveral of the vvealthy G.I.s in Paris vvould
finally end up in Fernand Leger’s post-vvar teaching studio. and the
first American paintings vvere exhibited in 19 4 7 . Hovvever, cinema,
pulp and Science fiction, fashion. music. and politics vvere the
arenas vvhere imported American culture or French imitations vvere
most obvious. The impact 011 form and style in these areas vvas
immense. as vvas lıostility to this ‘cultural imperialism’ vvhich vvas
countcred by nationalists, Communists and the broadly based
Mouvement de la P<nx. For m any years. hovvever. America as such
vvas not ‘represeııted’ iıı painting and sculpture. and abstract
expressionisın vvas sinıply subsumed into the art antre debates.
While Duchamp. Matta and Leger vvere at home in Nevv York, the
first extended trips by Sartre aııd de Beauvoir provoked a reaction
of shock. Both published iııfluential accounts of their experiences.2
The paiııter Jean Helion is an iııteresting intermediary figüre
here: at home in a very modemist’ Am erica in the late 19 3 0 S .3 his
return to realism just before the vvar vvas ratilied by his hümanist

fig.29 Andre Fougcron Transatlantic Civilisation 19 5 3 Oil on canvas
Artist’s Collection. Paris
orientation subsequent to imprisonment and escape. He returned to
Paris in 1 9 45. but Bovvery bums as vvell as Parisian derelicts inspire
his reclining figures and nevvspaper readers. although the 'Large
\lannequin' figures have an undeniable chic (no.74) Samuel Beck­
ett’s Pozzo and Lucky, lovvlife. farcc. the deteetive ııovel - ali mingle
vvith memories of America in Helion's ironic populism.4
Not until the early 19 5 0 S vvhen political antagonisms grevv
more violent. vvould the Cold War perse become an explicit matter
in terms of Realist painting. just as there vvas an attempt to ‘depict*
tlıe Oradour massacre at the Art atıd Resistance exhibition in 19 46 .
so at the Salon d’Automne of 19 5 3 . there vvere Socialist Realist pro-
test paintings of Julius and Ethel Rosenberg. framed by the C.I.A. -
it has novv been proved - and electrocuted as Soviet spies. Dominat-
iııg ali competition through sheer size vvas Andre Fougeron’s
‘Transatlantic Civilisation’ (fig.29). representing the NATO build-
ings in Paris, a huge Pontiac-Sedan car. replete vvith armed officcr.
an American soldier reading a pomographic magazine and various
other vignettes, some referring to the Korean War - presided över
by an empty electric chair - a referencc to the Rosenberg trial. The
painting has been discusscd exteıısively elsevvhere - and must cer-
tainly be given credit as a precursor of the politicised Nevv Figura-
tion movement of the 196OS. VVhat must be emphasised. hovvever.
beyond its explicit and visible Cold VVar content, is the return of the
repressed. the appearance of *low’ cultural forms. associated vvith
America and the Cold YVar debate. vvithin the grandiose ‘higlı’
genre of a history painting.s
Fougeron's Transatlantic Civilisation’ vvas itself. ironically.
a response to one of the tvvo American exlıibitions at the Musee
national d'art moderne in 19 5 3 : Twelve American Painters and Scıılp-
tors vvas slıovvn from April to June. joined by Mexican Art from Pre-
Columbian Times to Today from May to July. The latter corroborated
Fougeron’s creation of a nevv space for Socialist Realist painting. so
rcminiscent of the Mexican muralists. Contemporary American
dravvings vvere seen in October-November 19 5 4 . vvhile Fifty Years
of Arı from tlıe United States vvas tlıc vvatershed exhibiüon of 1955*
comprising not only painting. but sculpture. engraving. the deco-
rativc arts. typograplıy and advertising. Gestural abstraetion.
ineluding American varieties. vvas nothing nevv by this time: as
h a r is po st vvar
early as 19 5 4 Tapie spoke of an ‘anareho-informel selerosis made of
recipes vvhich have nothing more to do vvith the liberty of the spirit
and the imagination'.6 Responses vvere ambiguous to the 19 5 5
American shovv. It anticipated by four years the more celebrated
exhibition The New U.S. Painting vvhich likevvise tourcd majör Euro-
pcan capitals. arriving in Paris in January 1 9 5 9 . 7
A decadc separates the 19 5 3 American exhibitions at tlıe Musee
national d’art moderne from the svmbolic moment of passage so
beloved by the adepts o f ‘Hot Paint for Cold YVar’: T h e vvhole vvorld
rccogniscs that the vvorld art çenter has movcd from Paris to Nevv
York.' Alan Solomon’s triumphant public statement prior to the
avvardiııg of the Venice Bicnnalc painting prize to Robert Rauschcn-
berg vvas made in 1 9 6 4 .8 To ignore that decadc is to ignore the
happy exchanges betvveen Pop artists and the Noııveaııx Realistes
from the late 1950S. vvhich do not seem to have been contaminated
by C.I.A. iııterests or an obsession vvith Jackson Pollock. Far more
important are the reasons for a gcnuiııc episteıııological brcak in
the languages of art and society in France in the ıııid-ı 950S vvhich
explain vvhy the period represented in Paris Post War vvas so soon to
acquirc a nostalgic and mythical dimension. The decadc 1 9 4 5 - 5 5
has become a crucial hingc for debates about ’periodisation'. The
year 1 9 5 3 marked the first balanced retrospeetive vicvv in France of
art of the post-vvar era.9 The impending collapsc of ’high’ and lovv'
cultural catcgories. suggested by Fougeron in 1 9 5 3 coincided vvith
Stalin’s death and subsequent moves for political realignmcnt. Con-
currently tlıree events signalled an irrevocable loss of imıocence in
tlıc cultural field. The first. for artists. vvas tlıc discovcry of Marcel
Duclıamp: the ready-made offered an unexpected release from the
travails of the nıetier of the older generation. tlıe touch of a Boıı-
nard or a Matisse. even the haute cuisine of a Dubuffet. and proffercd
itself for transforıııation via the anthropological gaze of the Noıt-
veaııx Realistes. Secoııdly. the material nature of life dramatically
changed. Giacometti. Richier. Gruber created in an austere Paris
vvhere food vvas as scarce as artists’ materials, and vvirc. plaster,
bronze. canvas. oil paint had an integrity and a noble history. The
Paris of steak and clıips. soap povvder and detergents, ornamental
cookery and polyıııorphous plastics - deseribed in Roland Barthcs's
Mythologies of 19 5 7 . vvas materially and coloristically a differeııt
universe. a universe ofprom iscs and traıısformations. Finally came
the impact of domestic television. loııg after its domesticatioıı in
both tlıc United Kingdom and the United States: tlıc boanı in tele­
vision buying in France accelerated vvith the Coronation of
Klizabetlı II in July 1 9 5 3 . The relationship betvveen private and
public spaces. the role of cafe and nevvspaper. the appcal of litera­
türe and political joum alism - even religion - the conduct of leisure
activity as a vvhole vvas irrevocably modified by television.10 As a
corollorary. the role of the traditional Salons changed: the rejeetion
of Fougeron’s Transatlantic Civilisation' by Louis Aragon in 1 953
vvas tlıc last moment vvhen tlıe Salon d'Automne. the birthplace of
Fauvism in 19 0 5 . attracted national lıeadliııes.
Cauglıt on the horns of the periodisation dilemma, retrospeetive
accounts of tlıc period have been rcmarkably inconsisteııt.1 1 The
sclcction of vvorks in Paris Post War and my ovvn focus nonetheless
redress presentations of the period as one of obsessive Cold War
conccms. and countcr recent derision of the tradition of vvriting
about art. exemplified by Sartre. vvhich has been so fertile vvithin
French culture.12
An immense distance separates today's public at the Tate Gallery
from the vvorks and the critical positioııs displayed in Paris Post War.
f 471
P A K I S P O S T VVAR

The art of the T 9 4S -5 S period. conncctcd loosely to the varying gender: 'One is not borıı. but rather. becomes a vvoman*. the polv-
discourses held together under the aegis of the term *existentialism' semic ııtterances of an Artaud. seminal to the vvritings of a |acques
moves ııs vvith its languagc of'authenticity*. vvhelher this he real­ Derrida or a JııliaKristeva - the Im aginary Museum’ and themulti-
ism vvith roots in the academy and the model (Gruber. Richier. even valent 'open vvork*. ali heralding the 'post-modernist* scnsibilitv
Giacometti) or the refusal of ali but the basics of image-making these areas novv seen as of vital concern had their genesis in the
(VVols. Artaud . M ichaux). These artists rejected not merely the immediate post-vvar vears.n VVe m ay novv attempt to understand
notion of style but a late ınodemist paternity. Picasso in particular. them in a historical context. from today’s post-Cold W ar position.
and as such they bracker themselves vvithin a particular scnsibilitv. vvhere qııestions of humanism . qııesfions of Ftırope have become
Hovvever tlıc discourse of the Other. the Gaze. the problem of urgent. Paris Post Wâr speaks to us povverfully about these issues.

NOTBS

I I n t r o d u c t i o n t o ll.v is t e n t ia lis m .s II Humanism and Terror

1 Isid o rc Iso u . 'C ris p o u r 5 .0 0 0 .0 0 0 d c ju ifs c g o r g & ’ .
introduetion d unc nouvelle poesic e l tine nouvelle
m uslque. P a ris 1 9 4 7 . p .3 2 6 .
2 A n d re M a lr a u x . Psycho lo gie dc F a rt: U M usee
im aginaire. G e n e v a 1 9 4 7 . pp. 1 2 8 - 9 .
3 VValtcr B e n ja m İn 's c o n c c p t o f 'th e re v o lt o f te ch n o l-
o g y ’ a p p e a re d in th e c o n te x t o f fascism a n d m iiita ry
b u ild -u p in T h e VVork o f A rt In th e A g e o f M c c h a n l-
c a l R e p ro d u e tio n ’ . first p u b . in F re n c h . P a ris 1 9 3 6 .
tra n s. P ic rrc K lossovvski.
4 S e e M ich d ci K e lly . 'H u m a n isn ı a n d N a tio n a l tîn ity :
T h e Id c o lo g lc a i R e c o n stru c tio n o f F ra n c e '. in
Nichol& S Hcvvitt (ed .). Th e C ultu re o f R econstruction:
E u ro /m n Literatüre. Thought atul Film . 1 9 4 5 - 1 9 5 0 .
[ 9 8 9 . p p . 4 0 8 - 1 4 . F o r tlıe m o st ıv c e ııt o v crv levv o f
d e b a te s in P a ris s e e T o n y ju d t . Past tm p erfrel: French
ln ıelle clu a ls. 1 9 4 4 t 9 5 6 . B c rk e le y . l-os A n g e le s .
O.vford 1 9 9 2 .
5 Jc a n -P a ııl S a rt re . E xlsieıtü a lism a n d H um anism .
1 9 4 6 . tra n s. P h ilip M a irct. 1 9 4 8 . G a b riç l M a rc e l’s
F tre et a vo lr o f 1 9 3 b . im p o rta n t fo r b o th M e rle a u -
P o n ty a n d th e p e rso n a list E m m a n u e l M o u n ie r. h ad
ch a llc n g e d th e o m n ise le n t 'v o ic c ' o f K a n t 's p h il­
o so p h y .
6 M o u n ie r's Introduction a u x F.xistentialİsm es. s cria lisc d
in E sp ril from Ö ct. 1 9 4 6 . vvas p u b lish ed in 1 9 4 7 . S e e
M ic lıa c l K e lly . P ioneer o f the Catholic R eviva l: The Ideas
and In flu e ııc e o f E m m anuel M o unier. O xford 1 9 8 9 , an d
Jo h n H c lim a n . Em m anuel M o u n ier an d the N c\v C atho­
lic U f t. 1 9 ı o ~ ı 9 5 0 . T o ro tıto 1 9 8 1 .
7 P a u l F o u lq u ie . L'E xlsieıitIaIism c, Que sals-je?, P a ris
1 9 4 6 ( 3 rd c d .. 1 9 4 8 ) . p .6 . lix iste n tia lism is trc a te d
İn its th e o lo g ie a l, c o n c e p tu a l. p h c n o m c n o lo g ic a l.
'g e n e r a l'. a th c is tlc a n d C h ristia n a sp e e ts. p rio r to a
th ird s cc tio n d e vo ted e n tire ly to th e n ovv-fo rgotten
L o u ls L a v c llc .
8 Sa nıedl S o ir. 3 M a y 1 9 4 7 . in N o e l A m a u d (ed .). B oris
Viatv M a n u e ld e Sain t C erm a in des P res. P a ris 1 9 7 4 .
p .6 6 .
9 S e e Je a n -C la u d c l'O isc au . L esZ a zo u s. P a ris 1 9 7 7 .
j o Isou 1 9 4 7 . p p . 3 5 2 - 4 . İn Feb. 1 9 9 3 . vvitlı 6 0 0 .0 0 0
Jcvvish v o te s at s ta k e . s e v e n vvceks before a g e n e ra l
cleç U o n . P re sid e n t F ra n ç o is M itte ra n d (d e co ra ted
vvith th e O rd re d e la fra n c isq u e b y M a rsh a ll P e ta in )
iin a lly İn stig a tc d a n a tio n a l d a y o f m û u m in g co m -
m e m o ra tin g th e Grattde R a fle o î 1 6 Ju ly 1 9 4 2 vvhen
13 .0 0 0 Jevvs vvere ro u n d c d u p fo r d c p o rta tio ıı b y the
P a ris p oliçe.
1 1 S e e Lc D em i-siecle lettrisle. P a ris 1 9 8 8 : R o la tıd
S a b a tie r. İ r U t trişine, les creations et les crcatcurs.
S i c e 1 9 8 9 . G a b ric I P o m e r a n d 's Sa ln i-G h etto -des-
Prets. P a ris 1 9 4 7 . is p a r tic u la r ly re le v a n t to th e
P a ris Post VVar th cm c.
1 2 S ig n lfic a n tly , B e c k e tt's Com m ent c'cst. 1 9 6 0 . fol-
lovved th e im p a ss e in h is vvritin g fo llo vvin g th e odd
sn ip p c ts p u b lish ed in 1 9 5 5 a s Textes ıtou r rien.
T 3 S a rt re t 9 4 6 . p .2 S .
1 Je n n -P a u l S a rtre . 'I.a R d pu bliıjıte d u s ile n c e '. U s
U ı ı r e s Fraııça lses. 1 9 4 4 . re p u b lish cd in Je a n P a u lh a n
a n d l)o m in iq u c A u r y (ed s.). I.a Patrle s e fa it toıts les
İours. P a ris 1 9 4 7 . p p . 4 6 1 - 9 0 . q u o ted fro m Situation s
111. P a ris 1 9 4 9 . P - U -
2 Je a n -P a u l S a rtre . ‘ P a ris s o u s l'o c c u p a tio n * . in Sltua-
tlo ns tu 1 9 4 9 . p p .2 5 7.
3 |ean P a u lh a n . 'G u id e d ’ u n p etite v o y a g e e n S u iss e
a u m o is d e ju llle t 1 9 4 5 ’ . in C ah iers de la Pleiade. A u g .
19 4 6 . p .2 0 0 . c x p !a in in g 'th e g re a t vva vc o fd e p re s -
sio n th a t svvcpt llb c ra te d F ra n c e in th e la st m o n th s o f
1 9 4 4 -
4 S e e M ich el R a g o n . 'Je a n D ub uffet. s a rc-lation a ııx
e c r iv a in s lib e rta ire s ’ . D ubuffet. C oııfcrence et Collogue.
G a le r ic s N a tio n a le s d u Jc u de P a u m c . P a ris 1 9 9 2 .
pp. 3 6 - 4 2 . fo r P a u llıa n 's re la tio n s h ip in th e 1 9 2 0 S
vvith th e v e te ra n a n a r e h is t Je a n G r a v c a n d th e
in llu e n c e o f h is c irc le 011 D u b u ffe t's a n a re h is m a s
vvel! a s D ubufTet's re la tio n s lıip vvith C elin e . F o r P a u l­
h a n 's a n a r e h is t ın e m o rie s s e e 'A llo c u tio n '. 1 9 5 1 . in
Je a n P a u lh a n . O euvres com pleles. 5 . P a ris 1 9 7 0 .
p p .4 2 3 - 5 .
5 S e e P ie rre A s so u lin e . I."Epuration des intcllectuels
1 9 4 4 - 1 9 4 5 . B ru s s c ts 1 9 8 5 . p p .4 2 6 0 . T h e bitter
d e b a te betvveen tlıe in tra ııs ig e n t A lh e rt C a m u s in
Com bal e d ito ria ls a n d F ra n ç o is M a u ria c . vvho a im cd
a l a m o re C h ristia n p osition (deseribed p p .2 5 a n d
4 6 - 7 ) is c h a ra c te ristic a lly 'p u rg e d ' fro m A lb e rt
C a m u s . Actuelles. ecrilsp o litig u es , P a ris r 9 5 0 a ııd
re p rin ts.
6 S e e İ11 c o m p a ris o n U s G ra ffitl des torttnes, P a ris
1 9 7 1 : p h o to g ra p h s b y P ie rre Jo ly a n d V dra C a rd o t o f
th e vvalls o f tlıe M in istry o f th e In te rio r. P a ris, req u i-
sitio n e d b y th e G c sta p o d u rin g th e vvar.
7 S e e A s s o u lin e 1 9 8 5 . A ıın e x e 7.* O rd o n ııa ııc e 110
4 5 - 1 0 8 9 d u 3 0 n ıa i 1 9 4 5 ' . p p . 1 6 4 - 6 . re la tin g to
th e p ıırg in g o f lite ra ry a u th o r s . c o m p o sc rs. p a in te rs.
g r a p h ic a rtists . s c u lp to rs a n d e ııg r a v e r s . F o r a r t in
vva rtim c F ra n c e . e o m p a re M ich ö lc C . C o n c . A rtists
under V ich y: A Case o f Prcjudice a nd P ersecu lioıı. Nevv
Je rs c v 1 9 9 2 vvith ü ıu r e n c c B c rta n d -D o rl& ıc . l.’A rt de
la d e fa ite 1 9 4 0 - 1 9 4 4 . P a r is 1 9 9 3 .
8 O ra d o u r vvas th e s u b jec t o f s e v c ra l re a listic p a in tin g s
in th e A rt a nd R esistance c x h ib itio n in 1 9 4 6 . a s vvell
a s p o e m s (Je a n T a rd ic u ). a n d se u lp tu re s (F e n o sa).
D isc u ssio n vvas re a ııim a tc d vvitlı th e B 0 r d e a u x tribıı-
n a l o n th e O ra d o u r a tro c itic s in 1 9 5 3 . F o r th e latest
e x p la n u tlo ııs ( in v o lv in g N azi g old ) see R o b in M ack -
in e ss. O radour. M assacre an d A fierm a th . 1 9 8 8 .
9 S e e F ra n c is P o n g e . ’N o te s u r le s O tagcs*. P a ris 1 9 4 6
(vvritten 1 9 4 5 ) . P P -2 5 . 2 0 .
r o G e o rg e s B a ta ille . p re fa c e to M udanıe P.dwarda in
O euvres com pleles. m . P a ris 1 9 7 1 . P . 9 .
1 1 P ie rre A n g c liq u e [G e o rg e s B a ta ille J. M adam e
E dw ardıı. vvith ih ir t y e n g r a v in g s b y Je a n P erdıı |Je a ıı
F a u trie r], P a ris 1 9 4 5 (d e lilıe ra tc ly m isd a te d 1 9 4 2 ) .
p p .2 0 . 2 2 .
1 2 P a u l I r a u t a ııd . İjettcr o f 6 M a rch 1 9 4 5 - A rc h iv e s
N a tio n a le s. f / 1 2 9 6 4 0 . q u o tcd in A s s o u lin e 1 9 8 5 .
p .9 4 . IZ -au tau d s u g g e ste d a Jo u rn a l des ex clu s du
C .N .E . (C o m ite N a tio n al d es F c riv a ln s ) ( p .ı 1 1 ) .
r 3 A s so u lin e 1 9 S 5 . p .1 0 9 .
1 4 S e e l/n ıis-F e m a n d C elin e . Txî C assc-p ip c". Les C ahiers
de la Pleiade. S u m m e r 1 9 4 8 . p p .4 5 - 8 7 .
1 5 S c c J e a n P a u lh a n . U s E leu rs de Tarbes. o u la le rre u r
dans les lettres. P a ris 1 9 4 1 . d isc u s s c d b y M fch u cl
S y ro tin sk i. in D en iş H ollier (e<l.). A N e w H istory o f
Freııelı Literatüre. I la r v a r d 1 9 8 9 . PP- 9 5 3 - 7 - P u u lh u n
stcp p ed u p h is c a m p a ig n vvith 'J) e la p a ille et d u
g r a in '. p ts.ı a n d 1 1 . 'I.'illu sio n d c l’ E ly m o lo g lc '. U s
C ah iers de la Pleiade. A p ril 1 9 4 7 . A u tu m u 1 9 4 8 /
W iııtc r 1 9 4 9 . p p . 1 4 7 - 1 6 6 a n d \ V in ter 1 9 5 0 - 1 .
pp.107-31.
1 6 S e e L o u is D o m fn iq u e G ira rd , La G u erre Franco-
fran çaisc, P a ris 1 9 5 0 . a n d Jc a n -P ie r r e R icnıv. *1*1
G u e r re fra n c o -fra ııç a ise '. in M ic lıa c l S c riv e n (ed.).
[Var and S o ciety in T \ven lieth -C en lu ry France. Nevv
Y o rk . ()x fo rd . M u n lc lı 1 9 9 1 . p p . 2 3 7 - 9 1 .
1 7 S e e s la t is ılc s in Je a n P a u lh a n . U ıt r e a u x dlreeteu rs de
la resistance. P a ris 1 9 5 1 . re -cd ited b y Je a n Ja c q u c s
P a u v e rt. P a ris 1 9 6 8 . p . 1 2 a n d p .2 3 (q u otcd ). For th e
c o n te x t o f th e 'R e s is ta n c e ' d e b a te s c c M eııry R o u ss o .
L - S y n d ro m c de Vichy. de 1 9 4 4 d n o s iou rs. P a ris
19 8 7 .
1 8 U s C hefs-d'o cuvre des coHections p rivees fra n ç a lses
retro u v& s en A llem agn e p a r la C om m ission de R ecu/y-
ration artistig ue et les S ervices A llies. O ra n g c ric d es
T u llo rle s. P a ris . Ju n c 1 9 4 6 .
1 9 U ‘o n D eg a n d , a n a d v o c a te o f a b s tr a c t a rt vvas art
c ritic fo r th e C o m m u n ist jo u rn a l U s U t t r e s F ra n ­
çalses fro m 1 9 4 4 - 7 .
2 0 S e e I-eslic R u b in . 'T h e lx>st Y e a rs: A lb e rto C.iacom et-
l i ’s R e tu rn to K ig ııra tio n . 1 9 3 2 - 1 9 4 7 ' . u ııp u b lislıc d
M . A . th esis. C o u rta u ld In s litııte o f A rt. U n iv e rsity o f
l» n d o n 1 9 9 0 . fo r vvhich T a s litz k y 's a ss is ta n c e vvas
c ru c ia l.
2 1 T a slitz k y b o re G ru b e r’s b a m ıe r vvitlı th e p o rtra it o f
Ja c q u c s C allot th ro u g h th e strce ts İ11 P o p u la r Fro nt
p ro c c ssio n s. S e e A lb e rto G ia c o m e tti. ‘ A p ro p o s de
Ja c q u c s C allot*. l.ab y rin th e (G c n c v a / P a ıis ) . 110 .7 .
A p ril 1 9 4 5 . p .3 . M lch ö le C o n e h a s p ro vid e d t lıe m o st
e ln b o rate a ııa ly s ls o f th e ‘ H o m m a g c to Ju c q u c s
C a llo t' a llc g o ry . "to a b a n d o n K in g P h ilip (P eta in ) a n d
follovv C h a rle s. D u k e o f I.o rra in c (C h a rle s d e G a u lle
from Ix>rraine). S c c M ich fcle C o n e. ‘ " A b s t r a c t ” A rt a s
a V eli: T r ic o io r P a in tin g in V ic h y F ra n c e . 1 9 4 0 - 4 4 ' .
A rt B u lletin , J u n e 19 9 -2 . P--2 0 3 -
2 2 S c c ‘T c n d a n c c s a c tu e lle s dc F a rt c h re t ic n '. C ah iers de
l'A rt Sacre. 110 .7 . A u g .- S e p t. 1 9 4 6 . p p .ı 2 . 3 5 .
2 3 T h e fifth S a lo n d e la Je u n c P e in tu re . o f Ja n . 1 9 5 4
held a n im p o rta n t re tro sp e e tive o f G ru b e r's vvork. İle
vvas h a ilcd a s a n in llu e n c e 011 y o u n g a rtists fo r ö v e r
teıı y e a r s . R evievvin g th e s ix th S a lo n o f 1 9 5 5 . a c ritic
re m n rk e d ‘ V ia to rtu o ııs ro u te s - so m e tim e s co m -

1481

p le te ly o ff-beat a b o v c a li Ü ıro u g h BulTei. G ru b e r h a s
set h is se a l o n m a n y y o u n g p ain te rs vvho h a v e fo un d
in h im . c o n s c io u sly o r n o t. a sort o f s p irilu a l fra te r-
n ity ’ . G u y D o m a n , Liberation. Feb. 1 9 5 4 an d
u n n a m c d c ritic . A rts. Ju ıı. 1 9 5 5 . q u o ted in F ra n ç o is
P a r e n i a n d R a y m o n d P e rro t. La Salon d e la Jetine
P elnture: U n eh lsto ire. 1 9 5 0 - 1 9 8 3 . P a ris 1 9 8 3 . p .ı 3 .
S e e a ls o G u y V ig n o h ı. İm Jetine Pcintııre. 1 9 4 1 - 1 9 6 1 .
P a ris 1 9 8 5 .
2 4 C la u d c R o g e r-M a rx . *Une p la s tiq u c d e l'a b su rd c . ou
l'a b se n c c d c l'e sp o ir d a n s la p e ln tu re con tcm p o -
r a in e '. Pigaro Lilteraire. 1 S e p t. 1 9 5 1 . P- 9 -
2 5 A m b ig u itie s a r e rlfe from th e first vvords o f P ierre
D e sc a rg u e s’ s B ern ard B uffet. P a ris 1 9 5 9 . S e e M ich el
R a g o n . ‘ M o n d a n ltö d u " m i s t î r a b i l i s m e " i n L a Pein-
ture actuelle. P a ris 1 9 5 9 . p p . 5 6 - 6 2 (q u o ta tio n p .5 7 ) .
2 6 S e e m y a rtic le ‘C ath o lics. C o m m u n ists a n d A rt
S a c r e '. in P a trie k M arsh (ed .). The Conseience o f the
F rench: intelleetual Life in P o si-U beru iio n France. Nevv
Y o rk . O xford a n d M u n ic h (fo rth co m iııg ).
2 7 S c c S c r g e G u ilb a u t. 'P o stvva r P a in tin g G a m e s: T h e
R o u g h a n d th e S lic k '. in Reeoıvttrıtcting M odernisin:
A rt iıı N e w York, P a ris and M ontreal. 1 9 4 5 - 1 9 6 4 .
C aın b rid g c . M a ssa c h u ssc tts a n d I-ondon 1 9 9 0 .
p p .3 0 - 7 9 : S a r a h VVilson. 'M a rty rs a n d M ilitan ts', in
S c riv c n 1 9 9 1 . p p .2 1 9 - 4 6 . a n d C alls to R ealism : A rt
and Politics in France. 1 9 3 5 - / 9 5 5 . Nevv H a ve n a n d
Lo n d o n (forth com in g ).
2 8 S e e M au ric e M e rle a u -P o n ty . H unum ism c e l terreur:
Fssa l s u r le p r o b lim e com m unist e. P a ris 1 9 4 7 . from
vvhich “T h e Y o g i a n d th e P ro le ta ria n * is tra n sla te d
in Ja m e s M . Edie (ed.). M a urice M erleau -P on ty : The
P rim a cy o f Perception and O ther P.ssays on Pheııom eno-
logîcal Psychology. the Ph ilosoph y o f A rt H istory and
Politics. se rie s e d . Jo h n YVild, E v a n s 10 11. Illo n ois
1 9 6 4 . C h a p .7 .
2 9 S e e V ic to r A . K ra v c lıe n k o . J 'a l ch olsi la Liberte!.
tra n s. Je a n d c K crd e la n d . P a ris 1 9 4 9 . K ra v c h c n k o ’ s
re v e la tio n s vvere d e n o u n c c d a s a n ‘o b sc c n e ’ A m e ri­
c a n im p eriaU st fa b ric a tlo n by tlıe F re n c h C o m m u -
nists.
3 0 B ern a rd L o rjo u s lıa r e d th e P rix de la C ritigııe vvith
B uffet in 1 9 4 8 a n d vvas a n ıc m b er o f th e H om m e-
T c m o in g ro u p . S e e Je a n B oııret et a l . . ! .’A g e atom ique.
P a ris 1 9 5 0 . F ra n ç o is F o n v ie lle -A Iq u ic r‘s L a Grande
P e u rd e l'apres-guerre. P a ris 1 9 7 3 deserib es th e
g e n e ra l fc c lln g o f te rro r in life a n d politics.
3 1 Se e G cnevlfcvc B onnC fol. U s A nııees fertiles. 1 9 4 0 -
1 9 6 0 . P a ris 1 9 8 8 . p .2 3 .
3 2 Se e D avid R o tısse i. l.'U n iv e rs concentrationnaire. P a ris
1 9 4 6 (B u ch cn vvald ): U Proccs concentrationnaire:
Pour la verite su r les cam ps: E xtra lts des debats:
Declarations de D avid R otıssei. P a ris 1 9 5 1 (So vie t
la b o u r ca m p s).
III Cezanne’s Doubt: Painters of Failure
1 F ra n c is G ru b e r. A rts de France. n o .5 . P a ris 1 9 4 5 . p .7 .
2 S e e P ierre Tal-Coat. e x h . c a t.. G ra n d P alu is. P a ris
19 7 6 . T a l-C o a t livc d in C c z a ıın e 's C h â te a u N o ir
d u rin g tlıc vvar a n d re tıım e d to A lx in 1 9 4 6 7 . T h e
co m b in a tio n o f C ez a n ııism a n d japonisıne o f th is nevv
‘ S c lıo o l o f A ix ' vvas e n lıa n c c d b y th e p rese n ce o f
A n d re M asso n (in h is 'o ric n ta lis t' n ıo d c) a n d G e o rg e s
D u th u it vvho h a d p u b lish ed M y $tiqu e ch in o ise c l peitı-
ture m oderne. P a ris 1 9 3 6 . tlıre e y e a r s b efo re
C bzan n c’s c c n te n a ry c ele b ra tio n s in 1 9 3 9 (p ro b ab ly
th e im p e tu s fo r M erle a u -P o n ty ).
3 M au ric e M e rle a u -P o n ty . 'L e D ou tc d e C e z a n n e '. Fon-
taine. n o .4 7 . D cc. 1 9 4 5 . p p .8 0 - 1 0 0 . a n d iıı Stms et
N on -Sen s. P a ris 1 9 4 8 : tra n s, a n d vvith a p reface by
H u b e rt E. D rey fu s a n d Patriciu A ile n D rcyfu s
'C c z a n n e 's D o u b t'. in Sen se and N on -Sen se. R v an sto ıı.
Illin o is 1 9 6 4 . p p .9 - 2 5 . A ls o tra n s. S o n la B rovvncll.
fo r A rt a nd L iteratü re ( L a u s a n n e ). S p rin g 1 9 6 5 .
p p. 1 0 6 - 2 4 . fro m vvhich m y c ila tio n s a r e ta k e n .
4 It is a s p a rt o f tlıe im m en se p h ilo so p h ic a l an d
p h e n o m c n o lo g ic a l b lb lio g ra p h y o f U Phenom enolo-
g ie de la perception, P a ris 1 9 4 5 th at M e rle a u -P o n ty 's
C ez a n n e s o u rc e s a p p e a r: F m ile B ern a rd . L a M ethodc
de Cezanne. P a ris 1 9 2 0 : Jo a c h lm G n sq u ct. Cezanne.
P a ris 1 9 2 6 : a n d Fritz N o v o tn y . 'D a s p rob lem des
M e n sc h c n C ez a n n e im V e riıa itn is zu sein o r K u n s t'.
Z e ltsc h riftfû r A esthetik ıtııd allgem einer K u ııslw issen -
sehaft, 110 .2 6 . 1 9 3 2 . C ez a n n e re a p p e a rs in th e scc-
tion 'I.a C h o se et lc m o n d e n a t u r e l' in a d isc u ssio ıı o f
tlıc s y ste m o f a p p c a ru n c c s. p re-sp a tia l fllcds. tlıc c o n -
stru e tio n o f bo th o b je ct a n d m e a n in g th ro u g h th e
p a in t e r s m a rk s ( 1 9 8 3 e d .. p .3 7 3 ) .
5 M e rle a u -P o n ty tra n s. T 9 6 5 . pp. 1 0 7 - 8 . 1 1 1 . 1 1 4 .
6 C o n ıp a re W a ld e m a r G e o rg e o n F a u tric r's Otages
c x lıib itiq n : 'F a u tr ie r‘s d r a m a is th at o f th e h ero o f The
Unkno\vn A rtist', in La V o lx d e Pa ris. 8 N o v . 1 9 4 5 .
C d zan n e fa m o u s ly re co g n iscd lıim s e lf iri B a lz a c 's
a rtist. (T h e s to r y h a d been p u b lish ed in s e v c ra l ver-
s io n s in th e 18 3 0 S .)
7 D o m in iq u c R e y 's 'L a P ercep tion d u p ein tre et le
prob lem e de l e t r c : Kssai s u r l'esth Ğ tiqu e et I'o n tolo-
g ie d e M a u ric e M erle a u -P o n ty *. u n p u b lish e d d o cto ra l
th esis. U n iv e rslty o f F rih o u rg , Svvitzerland 1 9 7 8 .
a lth o u g h d isa p p o in tin g. siıo u ld b e n ıe n tio n cd .
8 B ra m v a n V elde iıı D errlâre le M iro lr. n o s. 1 ı - t 2 .
Ju n c 1 9 4 8 . p. r 3 . S c c a lso S a rt re ’s p la y l.'P.ngretıage,
P a ris 1 9 4 8 .
9 S a ıtıu el B e c k c tı. 'P e in tre s d e re m p e c h c n ıe n t* . Der-
ricre lc M iro lr. n o s .ı 1 - 1 2 . Ju n e 1 9 4 8 . p p .3 - 7 . See
a lso G e rm a in V ia tte . G eer Van Velde. P a ris 1 9 8 9 .
1 0 S a m u c l B eck ett. 'B r a m v a n V elde' (first p u b . in Tran-
sition 4 9 . n o .5 . T9 4 9 • P P -9 7~ ı< > 3). in P ro u sl and
Three Dlalogttes w ilh Georges D uthuit. 1 9 6 5 . p . t 2 0 .
T h e ‘ S c h o o l o f A ix ' p ro vid e s th e lin k betvveen
D uth uit a n d th e o th e r tvvo a rtists vvho a r e th e su b -
jccts o fd ia lo g u c . T a l-C o a t a n d A ııd re M asso n .
1 1 S c c D cn isc C olom b. Po rtra its d 'a rlis te s des anııees 5 o .
1 1 0 .3 5 . B ra m van Velde. P a ris 1 9 5 7 . a n d c a p lio n .
u n p a g .: ‘ B ra m v a n V elde g a v e m e a re ııd c z v o u s in a ıı
a b so lu te ly e m p ty s tu d io . O f c o u rs e . 1 kncvv lıls p ain t-
in g b u t 1 a d n ıit th at I n e v e r before u n d c rsıo o d th e
a c c o rd betvveen th e m a n a n d h is vvork: I h a d n 't
u n d ersto o d th e n ıy stic side o f h is vvork a n d th e m a n
p resen ted h im s e lf to n ıe a lo n e a n d a s p ea c c fu l a s a
m o ıık .'
IV The Theatre of Cruelty
1 M a u ric e M e rle a u -P o ıııy . ‘ Le D oute d c C e z a im e ',
1 9 4 5 . tra n s. 1 9 6 4 . p .ı 1 9 .
2 S c c P a ra llel Visions: M odern A rtist a nd O utsider A rt.
c x h . c a t.. Ix>s A n g e le s C o u n ty M u seu m o f A rt 1 9 9 2 .
vvhere m y e s s a y ‘ From tlıc A s y lu m to th e M u scıım :
M a rg in a l A rt in P a ris a n d Nevv Y o rk . 1 9 3 8 - 1 9 6 8 '
(p p .ı 2 0 - 4 9 ) c o n ta in s a n c x te ııs iv c d isc u ssio ıı o f tlıe
c o n te x t fo r D u b u ffet's a rt brııt a n d p h e n o m e n a su c h
a s th e C o b ra a rtists from C o p e ııh a g c n , B ru sse ls a n d
A m ste rd a m . vvh ich a r e n o t c o v c rc d in th is Paris
Post W ar.
3 First p u b. P a ris 1 9 4 7 . T h e a rtic le ‘S a Fo lie?'. A rts, 3 1
Ja n . 1 9 4 7 . re vle vvln g Dr B c c r 's p u b lica tio n D ttdem on
de van Gogh is rcp ro d u ce d in A rta u d . O euvres conı-
pletes. x ııı. P a ris 1 9 7 4 . p p .3 0 2 - 3 .
4 A ııto n in A rta u d . from 'V a n G o g h . th e M an S u icid ed
b y S o c ie ty '. in A nton ln A rtau d A n th o b g y . S a n F ra n ­
c isc o 1 9 7 0 . p . ı 3 5 -
5 A n to n ln A rta u d . p re fa c e to Portraits et dessiııs. e x lı
c a t.. G a lerie P ierre. P a ris 1 9 4 7 . u n p a g .
6 S e e A rta u d . ‘ C a h ie rs d e R o d cz '. S c p t .- N o v . 1 9 4 5 .
O euvres eom pletes. x v ııı. P a ris 1 9 7 4 . p .ı 5 7 . S tc p h c n
B a rb c r’ s nevv b io g ra p h v . A ııtonin A rtau d: B lo r n and
B oınbs. 1 9 9 3. sets u p a n a c c u n ıt c e h ro n o lo g y o f
A r t a u d 's life fo r th e first tim e a n d g iv e s a sen sitive
a n d c o m p re h e n siv c p ictu re o f h is C reative vvork in ali
m edia.
7 S e e A rta u d . O euvres eom pletes, x n ı . 1 9 7 4 .
p p .6 7 - 9 9 : S te p h e ıı B a rb e r. ‘ A r t a u d : T h e F in a l W ork.
1 9 4 6 - 1 9 4 8 ’ . u n p u b lish e d P h .D . th esis. ü n iv e rs ity o f
L o n don 1 9 9 0 . a n d B a r b e r 1 9 9 3 . C h a p .v ‘ İv ry -
Blovvs a n d B o m b s'. p p . ı 2 5 - 6 3 .
8 A n to n ln A r t a u d . P re fa ce to Portraits et desslns. c x lı.
c a t.. G a lerie P ie rre . P a ris 1 9 4 7 -
9 B arb er 19 9 3 . p .ı 4 3 .
1 0 G e o rg e s B a ta ille . 'N o tc : A d a m o v '. C ritigııe. n o .7 .
1 9 4 6 . p .6 5 4 . re p ro d ııccd in O euvres com pleles, x ı.
P a ris T 9 8 8 . p p . 1 6 2 - 3 .
11 IJ k e R a y m o n d Q u e ııc a u . B a ta ille a n d R a y m o n d
A ro n . L a c a ıı vvas affected b y A le x a ııd r e K o je v c 's
H cgcl ie c tıırc s in 1 9 3 3 . h is in tro d u etio n o f 'd e sire'
in to tlıc n ıa s te r/s la v c d ia le c tic a n d lıis n o tio n o f th e
'in v c rtc d form o f th e im a g e ’ . S e c A lc x a n d r e K o je vc .
İntroduetion d la lecture de H egel t R a y m o ııd
O u c n c a u 's n otes). P a ris 1 9 4 7 : Ja c q u c s L a c a n . Txr
S t a d e d u m iro ir c o m m e fo rm a te ıır d e ia fo n etio n du
P A R İ S P O S T WA R
Je '. P a ris 1 9 4 9 . in E crits. P a ris 1 9 6 6 . a n d R llsabcth
R o u d in c sc o : ‘ Ja c q u c s L a c a n d a n s lc m ir o ir d c la
p h ilo so p lıie '. İ r s E n jr t a philosophlgues des anııees 5 0 .
P a ris 1 9 8 9 . p p .8 7 - 9 8 .
1 2 H cııri M ic h a u x . Peintııres et dessiııs. P a ris 1 9 4 6 .
E Jisa b cth P le ss a 's u n p u b lish e d M .A . th esis. T İc n ri
M ic h a u x . tlıe S u p re m a c y o f th e H e a d '. C o u rta u ld
lııs titu tc o f A rt 1 9 9 2 . a lerted 111e to th e p roblem o f
M ic h a u x a n d th e m irror.
1 3 T h e ex h ib itio ıı d a te s vvere 2 1 S e p t. - 1 4 Oct. 1 9 5 0 .
Ö ver 2 .0 0 0 vvorks from fo rty-five c o llc ctio n s an d
scv e ııte e n c o u ılttİc s vvere c.vlıibitcd. in g c o g ra p h ic a l
s e c lio ııs. a ttr a c tln g ö v e r 1 0 .0 0 0 visito rs in less th an
a m o n th . S e e R obert V olıtıat. I."Art psyciıojHithologi-
quc. P a ris 1 9 5 6 .
T4 Je a n D ub uffet, 'H o n rie u r a u x v a lc u r s sa u v a g e s* .
Prospcctus et tous ecrits su ivan ts, 1 . P a ris 1 9 6 7 .
p .2 0 6 (p re fa ce 10 a m lx e d exhib iU otı G a le rie M arccl
E v ra rd , Lillc. 1 9 5 1 ) . S c c S a r a lı VVilson. 'D u bu ffet.
B rcto n a n d A r ı B rü t'. İıı 'F ro m th e A s y lu m to the
M useu m *. P arallel Visions t 9 9 2 . p p . ı 2 8 - 3 3 .
1 5 S e e M e rle a u -P o n ty 1 9 4 5 : M erleau -P on ty â la S o r-
bonne. R esuıne de cours. 1 9 4 9 - 1 9 5 2 . D ijon 1 9 8 8 :
a n d V ln c e n ı D cscom b es. ‘ V crs u n e c rise d'identlttf
en p h ilo so p lıie fraııçaise*. U s E ııje u x philosophigucs
des a n n & s 5 0 1 9 8 9 . pp. 1 4 7 - 6 7 .
V M a t t e r a n d M e m o r y : A N e v v P r im it iv is m
1 Je a n DubulTet. ’ A p le ln e s m a lııs '. iıı '.Notes p o u r les
fins-lettrös*. vvritten fo r in terested fricııd s in t 9 4 5 .
p u b lish ed in Prospcctus tuıx a m ateurs de tout geıırc.
P a ris 1 9 4 6 . rep u b lish cd in P ro s p e a u s et tous ecrits
suivants. r . P a ris 1 9 6 7 . p . 7 1 .
2 Jc a n -P a u l S a rtre , L 'lm a gination , N o u v e lle Ency-
clopöd ie P lıilo so p h lfju e. P a ris 1 9 3 6 . d isc u sse s the
q tıa lific atio n s a ııd ad d itio n s to D e sc arte s’s m e e h a n is-
tlc tlıe o ry o f p erceptio n fro m th e m id -n in eteen th cen -
tu ry o m v a rd s . in e lu d in g B e r g s o n 's ‘ p h ilo so p h ical
revolu tion * ( p .4 1) .
3 B ergso n h a d s e c rc tly c o n v e rlc d to C ath o licism long
before lıis d e a th . S c c H cn ri B e rg so n . E xposition cen-
lenaire. B ib lh th c g u e n a tio n a k, c x h . c a t.. P a ris 1 9 5 9 .
item s 2 S 2 - 6 for B erg so n stu d ics d u rin g tlıc O ccu p a­
tio n . p rec e d iııg tlıe O euvres com pleles, G e n e v a
1 9 4 5 - 6 . T h e E ıudes B erg so n k ıu ıcs p u b lish ed re g u -
la rly fron ı 1 9 4 8 5 6 . iıı 1 9 4 7 . a ıı H om m age national
vvas re n d e rc d to B e rg so n . in v o lv in g th e P rcsid cn t o f
th e K ep u b lic a n d M iııister o f E d u catio rı.
4 Je a n D ub uffet. ’A v a n t-P r o je t d 'ıın e c o ııfe re n c e popu-
la ire s u r la p cin tu re '. Ja n . 1 9 4 5 . vvritten a t Je a n
P a u lh a n 's re q u c st fo r a p rojected se rie s 011 p a in tin g
for a ıı u n in ltia tc d a u d ic n c c a n d p u b lish ed in Prospee-
tus a u x a m ateurs de toııt geıırc 1 9 4 6 . S e e Prospcctus et
tous ecrits su ivan ts 1 r 9 6 7 . pp. 3 1 - 5 3 .
5 T h e p oet E u g e n e G tıillc v ic . iıısp ire d b y th e 'M a tie re
a n d m e m o ire ' se rie s a sk e d D ubuffet to illu stra tc h is
p o e m s o n tlıc su b jec t o f vvalls. DubulTet first m et
M lc lıa u x a t h is G a lerie A n d re e x lıib itio n .
6 Je a n T c x c ic r. Gavroclte. 3 0 M a y 1 9 4 6 .
7 S e e Je a n L c sc u re . 'G a sto n B a c h e la r d ' in L 'E x press,
1 6 N o v . 1 9 6 1 .1 1 0 .5 4 4 . PP- Î 4 ‘ 5 - H is e m p lıa s is a s
re g a rd s th e a u d ic n c c fo r tlıc 1 9 4 2 le ctu re s is o n th e
p oets. a la s . H e n ıe n tio n s A n d re E re n a u d (vvho vvrote
th e te x t fo r F a u tric r's F en ınıc de m a vie. 1 9 4 8 ) . Paul
E lu a rd (vvhose Digııes de vivre vvas lllu stra te d b y F a u -
tricr). R a y m o n d O u c n e a u . E u g e n e G u illc v ic (vvhose
'lxw M u rs ' p o cn ıs vvere lln a lly p u b lish ed vvith tlıc 'Les
M u ı s ’ lith o g ra p h s in İ r s M urs. P a ris T 9 5 0 ). tlıe S ü r ­
realist B en in m in F o n tain c a n d th e y o u n g e r S ü rre a list
g e n e ra tio n - )ea n F ra n ç o is t ’h a b ru n a n d M au ric e
N a d e a u . th e a rtist R a o u l U bac: 'fo r tlıe first tim e th e
b ig n a m e s in nevv lite ra tü re a n d nevv p a in tin g vvere
r e g u ia rly m e n tio n c d ' in B a c h e la r d ’s le ctu re s.
8 G a sto n B a c h e la rd . l.'E a ıı et k s reves. P a ris 1 9 4 2 .
p .ı 4 6 .
9 C h ild re n 's d ravv ln g e x h ib itlo n s d u rin g tlıc O c c u p a ­
tion fu elfcd a grovvin g iııtc re st. A n e.vhibition o f c h il­
d r e n 's d ravv in g s a t th e M u see d u L u x e m b o u rg in
1 9 4 7 c o in cid ed vvith th e p u b lica tio n o f th e 1 9 2 0 S
P io n e e r G c o rg c s-H e n ri L u q u c l's İ r D essin e nfant in
( 1 9 4 7 ) . S e c a lso F ra n ç o ise M iııkovvska. 'D c v a n G ogh
et S e u r a t a u d e ssln s d 'c n fa n ts : A la re e h e re h e du
m o n d e d es fo rm es ( ro rs c h a c ti)* İ11 th e e x h . c a t..
M u s ic p ed ag o g iq u e . P a ris 1 9 4 9 . M a urice M erkatı-
P A R İ S POST WA R
P onty, â la So rb on ııe: R estim e dc coıırs. 1 9 4 9 - 1 9 5 2 .
D ijon 1 9 8 8 . d e m o n stra tc s a p a r tic u la r In tc rc st in
P îa g c t. L u q u c t, th e re la tio n s h ip betvveen ‘ Ita lla n a n d
ın o d c rn ' p a in tin g . ‘ in fa n tile a n d a d u lt' p a in tin g .
(p p .4 6 . 5 1 3 - 9 ) . b c sid e s d is c u s s in g L a c a n 's m irro r
s ta g e ( p p .ı 1 2 - 3 ) . H is p io ııc e rin g d is c u s s io n o f S a u s s -
u rc a n lln g u is tic s at th is tim e (pp . 1 0 - 9 0 ) C oincides
vvith th e lo o sc r th e o ris in g s o f a ııcvv p a in tin g o f
's ig n s '.
r o B a c h e la r d 1 9 4 2 . p p . ı 2 - 1 3.
r 1 Je a n D ub uffet. 'L a M aln p a r le ’ in 'N o te s p o u r le s fiııs-
le ttrıV in Prospcctus et tous ecrits su ivan ts 1 1 9 6 7 .
p .6 4 . q u o ted b y M ich el T a p ie İn h is p re fa c e to
M irobolus. M acadam cl C ie: lla u te s pâtes de Jea n
D ubuffet. e x h . c a t.. G a le rie R e n e D ro u ln . P a ris 1 9 4 6 .
p .II.
t 2 S e e G a sto n B a c h e la r d . I.a Terrc et les reverics de la
volonte. P a ris 1 9 4 7 . p p .ı 1 3 - 4 a n d . fo r e x a m p !e .
‘ M atie re et n tain - in e d it' in th e c o -p ro d u c tio n vvith
p oets a n d a rtists fn e lu d in g E lu a rd . P o n g e . F a u trie r
a n d R ic h ie r. A la a h ir e de la mattı, p rin ted u n d e r the
a u s p le e s o f th e e n g r a v e r A lb e rt F lo co n a n d th e g ro u p
G ra p lıie s . in 1 9 4 9 . S e c a ls o M a rc e l S c h a ttc l. 'G a sto n
B a c h e la r d et la le c tu re d c l'o e u v r e d 'a rt*. u n p u b ­
lish e d th esis. U n iv e rsity o f D ijon 1 9 7 2 .
1 3 T a p ie 1 9 4 6 . p .3 0 . A v v a v c o f p u b lic a tlo n s 011 th e
F re n c h R o m a n c s q u c b efo re a n d d u r in g th e vvar vvere
im p o rta n t. a s vvas t h c c x h ib it io n o f th e B a y e u x
ta p e stry at th e L o u v re at th e en d o f th e vvar a n d th e
o p e n in g o f th e M u see d c la frc sq u e (R o m ;u ıc s q u e
fre sco s) İıı ju n e 1 9 4 5 a t th e P a la is d e C h a illo t.
VI Under the Slgn of Sartre
t U n p u b lish ed Ietter from Je a n P a u lh a n to F a u trie r.
c. 1 9 4 2 - 4 (u n d ate d ) q u o tc d in G io rg io G a la n sin o ,
'Je a n F a u trie r: A C a t a io g u c o f h is E a rly VVorks'.
u n p u b lish e d P h .D . th esis. U n iv e rsity o f C h ic a g o .
Illin o is 1 9 7 3 . P- 9 - n . ı .
2 S e c ‘T r e n tc Q u a tre le ttre s d c Je a n D ub uffet â Je a n
P a u lh a n '. iten i t 1 4 . u n d a te d . S u n ııtıe r 1 9 4 6 . in Jean
Paulhan â travers ses peiııtres. e x lı. c a t.. G ra n d P a la is.
P a ris 1 9 7 4 . P P . 9 S - 9 . A b o u t to e m b a rk o n h is s ec o n d
re a d in g o f N au sea. D ubuffet m u s e s ılıa t b ap tlsm pre-
c e d e s c a te c lıis m .
3 S e e 'O fficial P o rtra its' a n d T a c e s ' in Verve. v o l.2 .
n o s . 5 - 6 . 1 9 3 9 (E n g lish ed.). pp. 1 2 - 1 3 » « d p p .4 3 - 4
re sp e e tiv e ly .
4 S a rtre . L ’lm aglnaire. P a ris 1 9 4 0 . p p .2 3 . 5 3 . 7 4 . 7 8 .
1 0 4 . 3 6 2 et seq .
5 Je a n - P a u l S a rt re . E xisten tia llsm an d H um anism .
L o n d o n 1 9 4 8 . tra n s, a n d iııtro d u c cd b y P h ilip
M airet. p p .2 8 . 3 4 . 4 1 . Ibld.. p p .4 4 - 5 : 'fo r o u tsid e th e
C a r tc s ia n c o g ito . a li o b je cts a r e n o n ıo re th a n prob-
a b l c . . . O u r a im is p rc c is c ly to e sta b lish a p a t t e m o f
v a lu e s in d istin e tio n from tlıe m a te ria l vvorld.’
6 S a r t r e too k m e sca lin in 1 9 3 5 . H e d e serib e s the
e x p e rie n c e s o f se e in g a n u m b re lla tu rn in to a v u l-
tu r c . d e B e a u v o ir 's slip p e r in to a lıu g c fly . iıı A Ie x a n -
d re A s t n ıc a n d M ich e l C o n ta t. S a rtre. uıı film . P a ris
19 7 7 . p p . 5 2 - 3 . T lıe e x p c rin ıc n ts c o in c id ed vvith tlıc
vvriting o f L'İm ag in a ire. İt vvas th e G e rm a n p h ilo s-
o p h e r in e x ile . B c n ıa r d G ro c th u y s c n , vvho in sisted
th a t S a rt re s h o u ld vvrite a e h a p te r o n tlıc a r t vvork at
tlıe en d o f th is text (ibid.. p .5 9 ) .
7 S e e \V illiam P la n k 's c x tc n d c d d isc u ssio n in S a rtre
and Sürrealistti. A n n A rb o r. M İc h ig a n 1 9 8 1 .
p p .6 9 - 7 8 .
8 S e e Je a n -P a u l S a r t r e . La Naustfe. P a ris 1 9 3 8 .
p . 2 2 - 3 . a n d \Vols, c x h . c a t.. G a le rie R e n e D ro u in .
P a ris 1 9 4 5 vvhere S a r t r e b ru s h c s s h o u ld c r s vvith
E c cle sia stic u s. P o c. M a c te rliııc k a n d m a n y K asterıı
p h llo so p h c rs.
9 Je a n -P a u l S a rtre , Visages. p ü r e d e de Portraits Offi-
cicls. P a ris t 9 4 S ( 9 2 6 C .vam plcs. e a c h vvith fo u r d ry -
p o in ıs b y VVols). p p . 3 3 . 4 0 - 1 .
1 0 S e e Je a n -P a u l S a rtre . N ou rritu res. s u iv i d es ex tra its de
la N ausde. P a ris 1 9 4 9 <4 5 ° c x a m p le s ) .‘ N o u r ritu r c s ‘
- n ıe u ıo rie s o f se e in g ro ıtln g food in N a p le s vvas
first p u b lish ed in Verve. 110 .4 . fa t ı.- M a r c h 1 9 3 9 .
p. 1 1 5 . Ja c q u e s D a n ıa se c o n lim ıc d to th e a ııt h o r (4
D ec. 1 9 8 4 ) th a t tlıe p u b lish in g v e n t u r e vvas h is id ea.
'to m a k e W o ls vvo rk '. S a rt re vvas a v v a re o f vvork in
p ro g re ss but did not s u r v e y tlıe p ro d u e tio n o f the
bo ok a n d did n o t c o m e to th e p u b lica tio n p a r ty . VVols
vvorks vvere a ls o u sc d to iilu stra te vvorks b y C am illc
B ry e ıı. R e n 6 d u S o lie r. A r t a u d . P a u lh a n a n d K a lk a :
see VVUI G ro h m a n n , ’ D as G ra p h ls c h e YVerk vron
VVols’ . (fiıa d ru m (B ru sse ls). 110 .6 . 1 9 5 9 . PP- 9 5 ~ 1 1 8 .
11 Je a n -P a u l S a rtre . ‘ D olgts ct n o n -d o lg ts4. İn \Vols en
Personne. P a ris 1 9 6 3 . pp. 1 0 - 2 1 . tra n s. A n n ic Fatct
İıı P e tc r In c il (ed.). C ircus W ols: The Life a ııd \Vork o f
\Volfgang Sch ulze 1 9 7 8 . u n p a g .
12 İbid. T h e vvritin gs o n \V ois a n d G ia c o m e tti. m a y be
c o m p a rc d to th e lite ru ry p iec e s (B m ıd e la irc . M all-
a rm c . G e n et. F la u b e rt. ete.) a n a ly s e d in M ich a c!
S c r iv c n . S a rtre 's E xlslen U a l E iographies. 1 9 8 4 .
1 3 Je a n -P a u l S a rtre a n d M ich el S ic a rd . 'P e n s c r F a rt'.
S a rtre et les A rts, Oblltptes. n o s .2 4 - 5 . sp e c ia l n u m b e r.
1 9 8 1 . p .î6 .
1 4 S e e R em i G ııllly , W ols. c x h . c a t.. G a le rie R e n e
D ro u in . P a ris 1 9 4 7 . vvhich reÛ ecls c x is t c n t ia lly u p o n
th e p a in tc r's e ss e n tia l so litu d e : 'A s so o n a s p a in tin g
is s e e n it jo in s tlıe vvorld o f p a in tin g live d b y o tlıe rs .'
1 5 Je a n -P a u l S a rtre . 'l.e s M obiles d c C a ld e r'. in Calder.
m obiles, stabiles. conslellutions. c x h . c a t.. G a lerie Iah i is
C a rre . P a ris t 9 4 6 . T lıc t c x t a p p e a re d vvitlı a n E n glish
tra n sla tio ıı in S i y k e n France. n o .5 . A p ril 1 9 4 7 .
p p .7 - 1 1 . in U s Tem ps M odern es. a n d th e n Situations
111. P a ris 1 9 4 S . Tvvo E n g lish v e rs io n s a p p e a re d İ11
A m e ric a v.’ ith in a y e a r . a s ’C a ld e r 's M o b ile s' a n d a s
'K x isten tia llst a ııd M o b ilist' fo r C a ld e r 's c x h lb itio n at
tlıc B u c h o lz G a lle ry . Nevv Y o rk . T h e P a ris c a ia lo g u e
c o v e r vvas a s tro b o sc o p ic p h o to g ra p h o f a m o b ile in
ıııo tio n b y H erbert M atte r. 0 . 1 9 3 6 . th e illu stra tlo n s
İn side lith o g ra p h c d a n d lıa n d -c o lo u re d b y M o u rlo t.
S a rt re v isite d C a ld e r 's stu d io in R o x b u ry t lıa n k s to
A n d r £ M a sso n . İt vvas D u c h a m p 's id ea to sen d an
e x lıib itio n in ‘p o sta b le ’ e lc m e n ts to th e G a le rie İzm iş
C arrtf a n d D u c h a m p vvho c o in e d th e rerm ‘ m o b ile ’ .
S e e C alder: A n A ıtlobiography w ltlı Pietures. 1 9 6 7 .
pp. 1 8 8 - 9 4 .
1 6 F ro m th e tra n sla lio n ‘ T h e M obiles o f C a ld e r '. in Jc a n -
P a u l S a rt re . E ssay s in A esthetlcs. t r a n s . VVade B a s k iıı.
19 6 3.P P .8 9 -9 2 .
1 7 H a r e h a d edited th e S ü rre a list p crio d ica l V .V .V . vvith
B rcto n iıı N evv Y o rk a ııd h a d p u rlo in c d h is vvilc. Ja c -
q u c lin e L a m b a . F o r th e te x t sec Je a n -P a u l S a rtre .
‘S c u lp tu r e â 'n ' d im e n sio n s'. in E xp ositio n D avid H are.
c x h . c a t.. G a lerie M a e g h t. P a ris 1 9 4 7 . K xtra c ts p u b ­
lish ed in A rts. 1 2 Dec. 1 9 4 7 . T h e t r a n s la lio n \ \ -
D im e n sio n a l S c u lp tu re" a p p e a re d in W om eıı: A Col/a-
b oration o f A rtists aııd W ritcrs. Nevv Y o rk 1 9 4 8 (not
u sed h ere). F o r th e full te x t se e M ich el C o n ta t a ııd
M ich e l R y b n lk a . U s E crits de S a rtre. clıroııologle.
b ib U o g ra p h ieçû m m en m . P a ris 1 9 7 0 . p p .6 6 3 - 9 .
H a re 's vvorks vvere in sp ircd b y tlıc S ü rre a list G ia ­
c o m e tti o f th e p eriod o f 'YV om an vvitlı h e r T lır o a t
C u t' 1 9 3 5 . vfsib lc a t T h e M u se u m o f M o d e rn A rt.
Nevv Y o rk , b u t n o t in P a ris , a n iro n y iost o n S a rtre .
r 8 M asso n did tlıe s c c n e ry fo r S a r t r e 's M o rts sa n s septıl-
lu re . in 1 9 4 6 . S c c A n d re M a sso n . ‘ B a ia n c c faussec*.
U s Temps M odern es. 110 .2 9 . Feb. 1 9 4 8 . pp. 1 3 8 1 - 9 4 .
S a r t r e 's t c x t o n M a sso n . ‘ L 'A rt ls tc e st u n s u sp e c t'
vvritten at th e s a m e p eriod ap|>eare<i vvitlı M a s s o n 's
Vingt-D eux dessiııs s u r k them e de desir. 1 9 6 1 . a n d a s
‘ M asson* 111 S ituation s iv . P a ris 1 9 6 4 . p p .3 8 7 - 4 0 7 .
M a s so n 's d ra v v in g s r e a p p c a r vvith M iclıcl B ııto r's
*T e x ta m o rp h o sc o u la re a b so rp tio ıı d u c o n ım c n to lrc '
vvith S a rt re in Sa rtre et k s arts. 1 9 8 1 . p p .2 0 5 - 3 6 .
1 9 A lb e rto G ia c o m e tti. ’ Izî R e ve . le s p h in x et la n ıo rl dc
T in L ab y rin th e (G c n e v a ). n o s . 2 2 - 3 . 1 5 D ec. 1 9 4 6 .
p p . ı 2 - 1 3. rc p ro d u c c d in A lberto G iacom etti. c x h .
c a t.. M u see d 'a rt m o d e m e d e la v ille d c P a ris 1 9 9 1 .
p p.4 1 2 - 1 4 (u n illu stra tc d ). d isc u sscd a t le n g th b y Je a n
C la ir, G iacom etti: U N cz: Paces de çarem e, fig u r e s de
carııuval, P a ris 1 9 9 2 .
2 0 Je a n -P a u l S a rtre . ‘ L es P c in t u r c s d c G ia c o m e tti'. Der-
rldre lc M iro ir. 110 .6 5 . M a y 1 9 5 4 . p re fa c e to G ia -
c o ıııe tli's sec o n d c x h ib itio n a t tlıe G a le rie M a e g h t.
M a y 1 9 5 4 . re p rin ted in U s Temps M odernes. Ju n e
1 9 5 4 . tra n s, a s 'G ia c o m e tti iıı S e a rc h o f Sp ace*. A rı
N cw s. v o l . 5 4 . 110 .5 . S e p t. 1 9 5 5 . p p . 2 6 - 9 . 6 3 - 5 . in
c o n ju n c tio n vvitlı G ia c o m e tti’s c x h !b itfo n at T lıe
S o lo m o n R . G u g g c n h c im M u s e u m . N evv Yo rk ,
re tra n sla tio ıı b y VVade B ask in 1 9 6 3 . p p .5 7 - 7 0 .
2 1 S im o n c dc B e a u v o ir. l.a Eorce de l'âge. P a ris 1 9 6 0 .
p p .4 9 9 - 5 0 3 . tra n s. P cter G re c n a s The P rim e o f Life.
1 9 6 3 . q u o ted in R e in lıo ld H o lıl, Giacom etti: Sculpture.
Painting. D ım vin g. 1 9 7 2 . p . 2 7 5 . C o m p a re S a rt re on
H a re : 'm a rb le s u d d e n ly r c v c a ls İts fa u lt. a p p a re n tly
ıın c h a n g e a b lc . a secre t c n ım b lin g c a ts it a vv a y . th is
p u re lıa rd e n in g o f s p a c e is m a d e o f s e p a ra b le par-
ticlcs*. C o n ta t a n d R y b a lk a 1 9 7 0 . p .6 6 3 .
2 2 Jc a ıı- P a ııl S a rtre . B ein g an d N otlıingness. tra n s. H azel
E. B a r n c s . 1 9 7 7 . p .3 0 .
2 3 S e e Alberto G iacom etti. e x h . c a t.. M u sö c d 'a rt
m o d e rn e de la v llle d e P a ris 1 9 9 1 . n o s . 1 2 2 - 3.
p p .2 1 8 - 9 . vvh ere a n a m ılo g y is s u g g e stc d . less con -
v fn c ln g ly . I tlıin k . vvitlı R o d in 's ' Faili tıg M a n ’ 1 8 8 2 .
2 4 S a rtre . B ein g and N otlıingness, p .2 8 .
2 5 'F o u r F ig u re s 011 a B a s e ' 1 9 5 0 . d e scrlb ed b y G ia ­
co m e tti in a letter to P ie rre M atisse . is th e p o in t o f
d e p a r tu rc fo r S a r t r e ’ s l e s P e ln tu re s de G ia c o m e tti’
1954-
2 6 Je a n -P a u l S a r t r e .'T lıc S e a rc h fo r tlıc A bsolute*.
tra n s. L io n el A b c l. iıı A lbero G iacom etti: F.xhibilion o f
Sculpture. Paintings. D ra w ln g s. e x h . c a t.. P ie rre M a t­
isse G a lle ry . Nevv Y ork 1 9 4 8 . p p .2 - 2 2 . p u blish ed
vvith G ia c o m e tti’s lirst Ietter to P ie rre M atisse . p p . ı 6 .
2 0 . S e e a ls o T-a R e c h e r c h e d e F ab so lu *. U s Temps
M odernes. 11 0 .2 8 . Ja n . 1 9 4 8 . pp. 1 1 5 3 - 6 3 . an d
re tra n sla tio ıı. VVade B a s k in 1 9 6 3 . p p . 9 3 - 1 0 3 .
2 7 R e in lıo ld H olıl n lc c ly jııx ta p o se s B a u d c la ire ’ s ü n e 011
P a sc a F s so litu d e : ‘ P a sc a le a v a it so n g o u lfrc . a v c c lui
se m o ııv a n t ' in U s P k u r s du m al ( 1 8 5 7 ) . vvitlı S a r ­
t re 's 'G ia c o m e tti a lla it et v e n a it a v e c u n g o u ffrc îı son
c ö te '. H olıl 1 9 7 2 . p .2 0 7 . S a r t r e ’ s B audelaire vvas p u b ­
lish e d in 1 9 4 7 .
2 8 S e c S te v c n l'n g a r . ’ R cb e llio n o r R e v o h ıtio n ' ( 1 5 Oct.
1 9 4 5 ) iıı D en iş H olller (eti.). A N e w H istory o f Frenclı
Literatüre. C a m b rid g e . M a s s a c h u s s e lts a n d Izıııdo n
1 9 8 9 . p .9 7 4 fo r th e lirst rc fc rc n c e in th is c o tıtc x t to
H e id e g g cr’s te x t.
2 9 M a rtin H eid e g g er. ‘T h e O rig in o f tlıe YVork o f A rt'.
1 9 3 5 - 6 , (First p u b . a s 'D e r U rsp rıın g d es K ıın st-
vve rk e s'. in H o lz m g c, F ra n k fu rt T 9 5 0 ) . in D avid
F a rre ll K rel (ed .). Heidegger: B a sic W rltlngs. 1 9 7 8 .
p p .1 4 9 . 1 6 4 . 1 7 0 - 1 .
3 0 S a r t r e 's m o n u m e n ta l Sain t Geııet. C on kdlen et
M a rty r. P a ris 1 9 5 2 , ’ revvro tc’ G enet*s life a s a tra g ic
c x iste n tia list p a r a b le vvith c x tr a o r d in a r y fa c tııa l dis-
to rtio ııs. (S a r tr e 's s u b -F rc u d ia n d e sire to c x p !a in th e
present. th ro u g h th e past a p p a re n tly obl'u scated
G e n e l's h a p p y c lıild lıo o d . c n tlıu s ia stic n ıilita ry s e r­
v ic e . ete. C o m p a re M a u ric e C h c v a lc t’s b io g ra p h y in
Genet, 2 . M a rse lllc 1 9 8 9 . p p. 1 1 - 1 7 . ) T h e sec o n d
e n o rm ity p erp e trate d b y S a rt re vvas litc ra lly to
a p p ro p ria te v o l. 1 o f G e n e t's O euvres eom pletes. P a ris
1 9 5 2 , vvith tlıis tcxt.
3 1 Fo r th e tra g e d y a n d a b s u rd ity o f G ia c o m e tti’s
o b se ss iv e ly p h a llo c c n tric u n iv e rse see C la ir 1 9 9 2 .
Fo r a p s y c h o a n a ly tic re a d in g o f th e S a r t r c a n o e u v rc
a s a vvhole. sec A n d rcvv N . I/ ;a k . The P erverted C on­
sciousness: S ex u a lity a nd S a rtre. 1 9 8 9 .
3 2 T h is vvas d isc u s s c d a t le n g th b y Ja c q u c s Izrcarnıe.
'Je a n -P a u l S a rtre : E crire İn g u e r r e ’ at th e lirst a ıın u a l
c o n fe re n c c o f th e U .K . S o c ie ty o f S a r t r e a n S tu d ie s.
In stitu te o f R o m a ııc e S tu d ie s. 2 3 Ja ıı. 1 9 9 3 .
3 3 S e e T h ic r r y d e D u v e 's c o m p re h c n s iv e s tu d y . G ia­
com etti: Portrait de Jean G enet: U S cribe captif. P a ris
19 9 i.
3 4 Je a n G e n et. L ’A le tler d ’A lberto G iacom etti, (p h o to ­
g r a p h s b y E rn est Ş c h e id c g g c r) P a ris 1 9 5 8 . u n p a g .
3 5 Je a n -P a u l S a rtre . 'L e s C o m m u n istc s c t la p aix*. U s
Tem ps M odern es. 1 1 0 .8 1 . Ju ly 1 9 5 2 . n o s .8 4 ' 5 -
O c t.-N o v . 1 9 5 2 . a n d ı ı o . ı o i . A p ril 1 9 5 4 . repu -
blislıcd in Situ ation s v ı. P a ris 1 9 6 4 .
3 6 S e c S a rt re a n d S ic a rd 1 9 8 1 . p. 1 5 . S a r t r e d eserib es
h is iııte n tio n s fo r tlıc Estheticjuc a s ‘ C e rta iııly to
c o n trib u te to a n e n se m b le o f tlıc sc s o n p a in tin g : to
a tte m p t to d is c u s s a t o n c e vvh at a p a iııte r a n d vvh at
a p ic tııre is’ . . . ’ I th o u g lıt to d o tlıe s a m e o ııe d a v for
sc u lp tu re ’ h e c o n tJn u e s (m o st c u r io u s ly j. A th c o ry o f
th e B e a u tifu l a s ’ to ta lisin g u ııific a tlo iı’ vvould lıa v e
b ecıı c e n tra l. F o r tlıc d isc u ssio n o f a rt in S a rtre 's
lite ra tü re a n d p o e try a n d fo r a rtists s u c lı a s D ıpo ıı-
Jad e s c c a ls o G c o rg c H ovvard B a u c r. S a rtre a nd the
A rtist. C h ic a g o 1 9 6 9 .

VII The Second Sex
1 S im o n c d c B e a u v o ir. The Seco nd S ex . tra n s. a n d cd.
b y H.M . P a rstı le y . 19 5 .3 : 1 9 7 2 . o p e n in g to p t.ıı
"IV o m c n 's Life T o d a y ’ , p .2 9 5 .
2 D or d e la So u eh & rc, p refa c e to G e m ıa in e R ichier
1 9 0 4 - 1 9 5 9 . G a lerie C re u z c v a ııll. P a ris 1 9 6 b .
unpag.
3 S e e U Theatre de l<ı moılc. P a ris 1 9 9 0 . H au te-
c o u t u r e m a n n c q u in s in th c a tric a l s c c n e ry shovvn a t
tlıe P a v illo n de M a r sa n . in M a rch 1 9 4 5 . to u re d to
B a r c c lo n a . Lo n d on . Leeds. N e w Y o rk a n d S a n F ra n ­
c isc o . a s a sym b o l o f t lıc r c n a iss n n c c o f P a risia n
vvom an a n d th e fa sh io n in d u stry . T h e c o lle ctio n is
novv o n p e rm a n e n t d isp la y a t th e M a ry h ill M u seu m
o f A rt. S a n F ra n cisco .
4 H a n s A n to n P r in n c r vvas a vvo m an . p rim a rily a
scu lp to r (p lıo to g ra p h e d in View . 110 .6 . t 9 4 6 a ııd pro-
filed in H orizon). S iıe vvas a tra n sv e stite vvhose tru c
se x u a l id entity vvas u nkııovvn to n ıa ııy in th e art
vvorld. S e c P ririn er. La F a n n ie tondue. iliu stra te d vvith
c ig h t e n g ra v in g s. P a ris. Ju ly . 1 9 4 6 a n d A ia in
B ro ssa t. U s Tondııcs: Un earn nval ınoche. P a ris 1 9 9 3 .
5 M a rg u e rite D ııra s. H iroshim a m an am our. S c e n a r io
a n d d ia lo g u e . Film b y A la in R c s n a is. P a ris 1 9 6 0 .
6 Dc B e a u v o ir q u o te s th e lavv o f 1 3 A p rii 1 9 4 6 . ‘ h old­
in g th a t th e c x iste n c e o f th ese h o u sc s is in c o m p a tib le
vvitlı th e e ssen tia l p rin cip le s o f h u m a n d ig n ity an d
th e ro le avvardcd to vvom aıı iıı m o d e m s o c ie ty '. in
The Second S cx . p. 1 6 7 .
7 B e a u v o ir. The Second S ex . p. 1 6 . S e e a lso C lıap . 7 . ’ l.e
D eu x ie m e s e x c ' in P a u l VVcbstcr a n d N ic h o la s
Povvell. Sa in t-G erına in-drs-P res: French Post-[V ar C ııl-
ture fro m S a rtre to B ardot. 1 9 8 4 . p. r 5 7 . Ö v er o n e
m illio n c o p ie s vvere sold İn th e U nited Sta tes. T lıc
C o m m u n ist P a rty ’s U n ion d es F e m n ıcs F ra n ç a is e s
a n d th eir c o n s c rv a tiv c p o lic y 0 11 vvom en a t th e tim e
is a topic b e y o n d th e sco p e o f th is e s s a y .
8 K in s e y 's re p o rt on m a le s e x u a lity vvas p u b lish ed in
F ra n c e in 1 9 4 8 : tlıc repo rt 011 fen ıale sex u a llty
( 1 9 5 3 ) c a m e ou t in F re n c h in O cto ber 1 9 5 4 . S e c
Isa b e lle M o rc a u . M o ricp m po rtem en l sexu el: U ne fr a n ­
çaise rtpond aıı guestlonnalre K insey. P a ris 1 9 5 3 . T h e
im p a ct o f film is a n o th e r d im e n sio n : s e e G iıu ı l/m ı-
b ro so . L'A m c de la feım ne. P a ris 1 9 4 7 . o r De la vanıp d
la fem m e. L ’ Ecran n o .2 . Fcb. -M arclı 1 9 5 8 .
9 S e e S im o n e d e B e a u v o ir. 'F a u t-ll b ru ie r S a d e ? ', in
P rivilegcs. P a ris 1 9 5 5 . p p .9 - 8 9 : B rig itte Bardot 011 le
syn drom e l.olita. P a ris 1 9 5 9 . tra n s, a s B rigitte Bardot
an d the L o lita S yn drom e. 1 9 6 0 : vvitlı G iscle M alim i et
a l.. Diam ila Bonpacha. P a ris t 9 6 2 .
r o T lıe 6 0 0 .0 0 0 p ro stitu te s In d ica te d «an iııc re a sc o f
2 0 0 .0 0 0 sin c e th e vvar (Com bat, 1 2 S e p i. 1 9 4 7 ) .
1 1 S a rtre . L 'ln ıag in a ire, P a ris 1 9 4 0 . tra n s, a s The P s y ­
chology o f im agination. 1 9 5 0 . p p .2 1 7 - 1 8 .
1 2 S e e F ra n c e s M o rris. 'Je a n HtMion. from A b stra etio n
to F ig u ra tio ıı'. u n p u b lish e d M .A . th esis. C o u rta u ld
Iııstitu te o f A rt. U n iv e rsity o f L o n d o n 1 9 8 3.
p p .3 4 - 6 .
1 3 S a rt re ’s c h a ra c te risa tio n o f th e v isc o u s a s th e svvcct
a n d fe ıııin in c ‘ r e v c ııg c o f tlıe eıt-soT in B eing and
N otlıingness vvas c h a llc n g c d b y S u z a n n e U la r in A
propos de Sa rtre et Faınoıır. P a ris 1 9 6 7 . p .7 7 : h e vvas
c a lle d a 'tra d ltio n a l scxist* b y M a r g e ry C o llin s a n d
C h ristin e P ie rce. ‘ H oles a n d S ilm e : S c x ism in S a r t r e 's
P sy c h o a n a ly sis* . in C aro l C . G o uld a n d M a rx W .
V V artofsky (eds.). [Vom en a nd Philosophy. Nevv Y o rk
1 9 7 6 . p . ı 2 5 . S e e D o ro th y M a c C a ll. 'R xlste ııtia lisn ıe
ou fem inism e*. in Sa rtre. sp c c ia l n u m b e r o f OM/r/ars.
n o s . 1 8 - 1 9 . 1 9 7 9 - p p . 3 1 1 - 2 0 . . a n d M ich ele le
DoeufT. 'S im o n c d e B e a u v o ir a n d LLvistenrialism '.
Fem inist Studies. n o .6 . 1 9 8 0 . p p .2 7 7 - 8 9 .
1 4 S e c S im o n e W cil’s p o s tlıu m o u s vvork. La P esan teuret
la g ra ce . P a ris 1 9 4 8 .
1 5 R e n e d e S o licr. 'L 'O e u v rc e st u n re n d e z -vo u s’ . Der-
r iir e le M iroir. n o . 1 3 . 1 9 4 8 . p p .4 - 5 .
1 6 A n d r6 P ie rre d e M a n d ia rg u c s . 'L a M aiıı d e c h a în e e ’ .
Le Disıjue Veri. n o. 3, Jı ıly - A u g . 1 9 5 3 . in G em ıa in e
R ichier. G a le rie C re u z c v a u lt. P a ris 1 9 6 6 .
1 7 R ic h ie r's sp iritu a l fo re b e a r a n d h o m o n y m vvas L ig ler
R ic h ie r. th e six tc c n th -c e n tu ry F re n c h to m b scu lp to r.
1 8 S e e p rc v io u s s e e tio n . n .3 6 . S a rtre said : 'B e a u ty Is a
to ta lisin g u tıification oft'ering th ro u g h th at totali-
sa tlo ıı th e sp e etre o f a ııc v e r-a c h ie v e d ro ta llty . a n d it
is in th e re la tio n sh ip betvveen to ta lisa tio n a n d total-
ity that 1 vvould find th e id ea o f B e a u t y .’
1 9 C elso C o n s ta n tin i’ s ‘ D ell’ A rte s a c r a d e fo rm a tric c ’ .
th e Osservatore R onm no's a rtic le o f r o J u n e 1 9 5 t.
vvas reprod u ced a li ö v e r tlıe vvorld. R ic h ie r’ s c ru cifix
re a p p ea re d on th e lılg h a lt a r. e lassilied a s a lıisto ric a l
m o n u n ıcn t. in 1 9 7 1 . Fo r a full a c c o u n t o f th e
’S a c r e d A rt q u a m T . th e th e o lo g ic a l a n d p olitical an d
h ü m a n ist b a c k g ro u n d . see m y a rtic le : ’C ath o lics.
C o n ım u n ists a n d A rt S a c r e '. in P a tric k M arsh (ed.).
The Conscience o f the French: İntelleetual Life in Post-
Liberatlon France. O xförd, M u n ic h . Nevv Y o rk 1 9 9 3
(fo rth co m iııg ).
2 0 M an R a y . 'D es c h a t s et d es m a g n o lla s '. U Surreal-
ism e M em e. n o. 1 . 1 9 5 8 . p .7 . S e c a lso Exı>osltion.
InicRnatiO nale du Surrealisıne (E R O S ). e x lı. c a t..
G a lerie D an iel C o rd icr. P a ris 1 9 5 9 .
2 1 T h e scven ty-tvvo a rtist re tro sp e e tive at tlıe G ra ııd
P a la is o f 1 9 7 2 . Doıızc arıs d ’art contenıporain featu rcd
tvvo vvom en : o n shovv vvere s ix vvorks b y N iki dc
S a in t P h a lle a ııd tvvo sm a ll te x ıilc p icce s b y the
A m e ric a n . S lıc ila H icks.
2 2 S e c S u z a n n e L ila r. Le M aleııtendu du dcuxicıne sexc.
P a ris 1 9 6 9 .
V III The l m a g i n a r y Museum
1 A n d re M a lra u x . Le M usee im aginaire: Psychologic de
Fart, G c n c v a 1 9 4 7 . p. r 3 (m y tra n sla lio n ).
2 E vh ib itio n s o f IzSger. P ic a sso a n d M atisse at th e
C o m n ıu ııist-b a ck e d M aiso n d e la P e n sç e F ra n ç a is e
a r c but o n e c x am p le .
3 Q uoted b y C am ille B o u rn Iq u e l iıı h is revievv o f M al-
r a u x 's U M usee im aginaire. iıt E sp ri t. M a rch 1 9 4 8 .
pp. 5 0 7 - 8 .
4 V Yaltcr B c ııja m in . 'L ’O e u v rc d 'a rt a l'6 p o q u e de sa
re p ro d u e tio n m d ra n lstfc'. ofTprint from Zeitschrift fu r
Sozialforschung. 1 1 0 .t . P a ris 1 9 3 6 . d e d ica tcd to M al-
ra u x : scc Bibllothcgue A ndre M a lrau x. M usee
n a tio n a l d ’a rt m o d ern e, C eıı t re G e o rg e s P om pid ou ,
P a ris 1 9 8 6 . item 1 7 6 4 . p . 1 6 . B e n ja m iıı's tc xt vvas
tra n sla tc d b y P ie rre K lossovvskl. th e G e rıııa n ist a n d
b ro th e r o f B a lth u s. S e e W a lter B e n ja m in . E critsfra n -
çals p resen ted b y J.-M . M o n n o y e r. P a ris 1 9 9 1 .
p p .ı 1 4 - 9 2 fo r th e v a rio u s v e r s io n s a n d c o n tc x t.
5 Se e Encyclofiedle plıotographiguc de Fart 13 v o ls . ).
M usee d u L o u v re . P a ris 1 9 3 5 - 8 . in Bihliothcgue
A ndre M a lraııx 1 9 8 6 . iteni 9 6 6 . p .2 9 .
6 S e e 'L a P sy c h o lo g ic d e l'a r t ’ . Verve. n o . 1 . D ec. 1 9 3 7.
p p .4 1 - 8 : ‘ La P sy c h o lo g ic d es rc n a issa n c cs*. Verve.
110 .2 . S p rin g 1 9 3 8 . p p . 2 1 - 5 : "De la re p resen ta tio n en
orien t et en o e d d e n t*. Verve. 110 .3 . S u m m e r 1 9 3 S .
p p .6 9 - 7 2 : 'E sq ııissc d 'u n e p sy c h o lo g ic d u c fn lm a ’ .
Venvr. n o .8 . Ju tıe 1 9 4 0 . p p .6 9 - 7 3 . R e fo rm u late d as
Estpıisse d ’une psgciıologic du ciıh ın n . P a ris 1 9 4 6 :
Psychologic de F art. t. U M usee im aginaire. G c n c v a
1 9 4 7: Psychologie de F a rı. 11. I.a C rcalion artistigue.
G c n c v a 1 9 4 8 : Psychologie de Fart 111. La M o n n a iede
Fahsolu. P a ris 1 9 4 9 . 1 9 5 0 : th e trilo g y rc lssu e d a s U s
Voix du silence. P a ris 1 9 5 1 : tra n s. S tııa rt Gİlbcrt a s
The Voices o f Silence. Nevv Y o rk 1 9 5 3 .
7 C o n c lu sio n o f I.a M oıuuıle de Fahsolu 1 9 4 9 .
8 La M onnaie de Fahsolu 1 9 4 9 . pp. 1 2 S - 9 .
9 T h e rc fe rc n c c is to C h ristia n Z c rv o s ’ s d a y -to -d n y
co m p ila tio n o f th e P ic a sso c a ta lo g u e ra is o n n e . vvith
P ic a ss o 's d a ily d a te d vvorks: a p ra ctic c th at D ubuffet.
c h a ra c te ristic a lly brazen . vvould b e th e first to
in ıitate.
1 0 R c fe rc n c c to th e c in c n ıa is in siste n t. T in to re tto ’s
Ascent to C a lva ıy ( 1 5 6 6 ) a n tle ip a te s E ise ıısıe iıı's
Battleshfp Potenıkin ( 1 9 2 5 ) a n d M a ir a u x 's ovvıı film
Es/sıir ( 1 9 39). fo r e x a m p le . S e e L a C rcalion artistiğin•
r 9 4 8 . p.2(X>.
1 1 S e e M a lr a u x ’s iro ııic e d ito ria l 'E lo g c d c la to rtu re ’ in
h is p rotest jo u m a l L ’lndochlnc enrhainee. 110 .2 .
1 9 2 5 . p .5 : U s C oııguerants. P a ris 1 9 2 8 : La Condition
H um aine. P a ris 1 9 3 3 .
12 T h e id ca s o f th e M aiso n d e la C u ltu re. fo cu s fo r the
b ro a d ly b a se d d eb ates o f tlıe A s so c ia llo n o f R e v o lıı-
tio n a ry A rtists a n d W ritc rs in tlıc T 9 3 0 S . vvas
rc la u n c lıe d . vvith dilTerent politics. th ro u g h M al-
ıa u .v 's ovvn in ltia tiv c s a s M iııister o f C u ltu re İ11 tlıe
1 9 6 0 S . a s p art o f lıis d e c e n tra lisa tio n policy.
13 T h is is not tlıc p la c c for a n a ss e ss ıııe ııt o f M a lra u x 's
c a re e r a s M in istcr o f C u ltu re for th e Fiftlı R cp u b lic.
fo r vvhich see G e ra rd M o u n ie r. D es B eau x -A rts au x
a r t s plastigues, B esa n ço n 1 9 9 1 . P P .2 5 9 - S 2 .
r4 G e o rg e s D u th u it. Lc M u see İnim aginable. 1 . P aris
1 9 5 6 . p .2 5 .
15 S e e A lc c M ellor. La Torture: Son lıistoire. so n abolitioıı.
sa rtiıpparition aıı X X tem e sieele. P a ris 1 9 4 9 . csp.
P A R İ S P O S T VVAR
C lıap . x ı: 'T o rtu re policlfcre: F ra n c e ’ . H en ri A lle g 's La
Ç uestion on to rtu re in A lg c ıia vvas b a n n e d in A p ril
1 9 5 8 . p rccip itn tin g M a lra ııx ‘s p rotest t o d e G a u lle ,
a lo n g vvith S a n r e . M a u rla c a n d R o g c r M artin du
G a rd . iıı tlıe n a tio n a l p ress. 1 7 a n d 1 8 A p ril.
1 6 M a lra u x 's e x h ib itio ııs o f In d o -h elle ııic. 'G oth ico-
b u d d h ist’ a n d ’G re co -b u d d h ist' s c u lp tu re at th e
G a lerie dc la N o u v elle R e v u e F ra n ç a is e in 1 9 3 1 vvere
s c n ıiııa l fo r F a u tric r's e a r ly s e u lp tu re s a ııd h is erod cd
a n d povvdcred s u rfa c e s. D u rin g th e s a ıııe p eriod Fau -
trie r n ıa d c tlıe lith o g ra p h ic ink p ro o fs fo r tlıe s e rie s o f
illu stro tio n s fo r D a n tc 's lııfern o th at a r c th e h isto ric
p rec u rso rs o f 1 9 4 0 S Inform el p a in tin g . a n d vvhich
M n lrau x vvould a c q u irc . M a lıa u x revievved F a u tric r's
1 9 3 3 c.vhibition a t th e G a lerie d c la N o u v elle R c v u e
F ra n ç a ise . rcn evviııg h is frie n d sh ip at tlıc tim e o f the
Otages cx h ib itio n at th e G a lerie R c ııe D rou in .
1 7 M a lra u x c a lle d tlıe m e ta m o rp h o ses o f s iy le 'lo ııg
s c a r s o f th e p a s sa g c o f fate ö v e r th e fa ce o f tlıe e a r tlı'.
S e e a lso D uth uit 1 1 9 5 6 . p .2 5 .
1 8 Fo r a n id ea o f th e b rc a d th o f M a lr a u x ‘s o u tp u t an d
u ch ic v c m e n t s e e Andrı1 M a lra u r, c x h . c a t.. S a iııt P a u l
1 9 7 3 . P a sc a l S a b o u r in 's I.a R ef 1cx io n su r Fart
d 'A n d re M a lrau x. P u rls 1 9 7 2 s h o u ld a lso be noted.
IX The Open W o r k
1 M ich el T ap ie. P re fa ce . IL IV .P .S .M .T .B .. c x h . c a t..
G a lerie C olettc A llc n d y . P a ris 1 9 4 S . u n p a g .
2 M ich el T ap ie. ’ F ih lq u e \ in H .IV .P .S .M .T .B . 1 9 4 8 .
a lso re p ro d u ced in F ra n c e sc V ic eııs. Prolegom enes â
tine esthcih/ue antre de M ich el Taphf B a rc c lo n a 1 9 6 2 .
P T 7-
3 Je a n P a u lh a n . T .'A rt In fo rm e l'. Elogc. P a ris 1 9 6 2 .
p .2 3 -
4 S e c F a u trie r’s illu strn tio n s to R o b crt G a n z o 's poenı.
U spu g u e. T 9 4 2 (lith o g ra p h s b y M o u rlo t. p rin ted by
D u ra ııd . 1 9 4 2 1 . R e fe re n c es to u ffin itics vvith C ou rbet.
R e d o ıı. i'u r n e r . M oııct a p p e a r iıı P a u lh a n ’s p refa c e to
Fa utrier: O euvres ( 1 9 1 5 - 1 9 4 3 ) . c x h . c a t.. G a lerie
R c ııe D ro u in . P a ris 1 9 4 3 . vvhich vvas th e lirst ve rsio n
o f Fau trier: L ’E nrage, P a ris 1 9 4 9 .
5 I th u s d iv erg e from S e rg e G u llb a u t's c oııfid eııt
o p in io ıı th a t th e Inform el ’ d e riv ed from vvhat G eorges
B a ta ille h a d n a m c d th e " fo r m le s s " İn th e 1 9 2 0 S ’ in
S e rg e G u llb a u t (cd.). R eco nstnıcting M odern isin: Art
in N e w York. Paris and M ontreal, 1 9 4 5 - 1 9 6 4 . C am -
bridge. M a ssa c h u sse tts a n ıl Izm d o n 1 9 9 0 . p p .5 0 . 5 9 .
S e c m y artic le 'Je a n F a u trie r a n d G eo rg es B ataille*. to
b e p u blish ed in C a r o iin c G ill (cd.). Georges Bataille:
IVriting tlıe Sacred. 1 9 9 4 .
6 V V aldem ar G c o rg e in La V o ix d e Paris, 8 N o v. 1 9 4 5 .
H is a n a lo g y p receded M e rle a u -P o n ty ’ s in 'L e D oute
de C ez a n n e ' b y o n e n ıo ııth .
7 S e e m y artic le 'Je a n F a u trie r. ses e c r iv a in s et ses
p oetcs' in E rrire la pcirıturc, ed. a n d iııtro d u eed by
Ph ilip p e D c la v c a u . P a r is 1 9 8 7 . p p . 2 4 1 - 5 1 .
8 Je a n D u b u ffet.’ N o tes p o u r le s fin s -lc tire s': ’ P a rta n t
de F in fo rm e ', in Prospectus et am ateurs de tout geıırc.
P a ris r 9 4 6 a ııd in Pros/fcclııs el tous ıferits suivants. 1 .
P a ris 1 9 6 7 . p .5 4 a n d n o te s. p .4 6 4 . C o m p a re G asto n
B a c h e la rd . 'ü n e r e v e rie d c la m a tiiîrc'. R âves d ’Enere.
Sep t. 1 9 4 5 . u n p a g . T lıe tvven ty-five in k decal-
c o ım ıııia s iııtro d u eed b y P a u l E lu ard . R c n Ğ C h a r.
Jttlîen G ra c q a n d G a sto n B a c h e la rd e vo k e d (he
im p o rta n t S ü rre a list h e rita g e a n d pro.vim ity o f th e
Inform el to th e c u rre ııt R o rs c h a c h test eraze.
9 |e a n D ubuffet. İn P lus beaux g u ’ils ne croient. beanx
nıalgre eu x . c x h . c a t.. G a le rie R e n e D ro u in . P aris
19 4 7 . u n p a g . S e c a lso E n rico C risp o lti's se v e n -p a g e
d isc u ssio n o f th e o r ig in s a n d u s a g c o f th e term
Inform el in L ’lnform ale: S to rla e /foeılea. v o l . ı . In
Ettropa, 1 9 4 0 - 1 9 5 1 , A ssisi/R o m c 1 9 7 1 . p p .4 7 - 5 4 :
tlıe th re c n u m b e rs o f P reuves. n o s. 1 5 6 - 8 . F e b .-A p ril
1 9 6 4 d evo ted to 'L 'A rt inform el* a n d G e o rg e s M aı-
h ic u . 'M ise a ıı p o in t su r l'a r t in fo rm e l' in 1 1 0 .1 5 9 .
M ay 1 9 6 4 (vvhere lıc c lo im s lıis ovvn p n te m ity for
th e term İ11 1 9 5 1 ) . N e ith e r C risp o lti n o r M ath ieu
m e n tio n B ata ille .
r o S e c C am ille B ry e n a n d Ja c q u e s A u d ib e rli. L ’O uvre-
boite. eollogue ablıum anisle, P a ris 1 9 5 2 . U m bcrto Eco
q u o tes A u d ib erti o n B ry c ıı e x le tıs iv c Jy iıı 'T lıe O pcıı
VVork in th e Y 'isual A rts '. in The Open [Vork. M ilan
1 9 6 2 tra n s. A n n a C a n c o g ııi. H a rv a rd 1 9 8 9 . p .9 2 .
'S u b m c d u lla r y s ta p h lo c o c c i'. ‘ m o lcc u les o f tlıc
C h e m ic a l p icto ria l s u b s ta n c e s ' a r c e vo k e d : 'A n d sııd-
h a r is p o st w a r
d e n ly . th e p a in tin g g iv e s w a y to a so rt o f c y b c m c t ic s
. . . YVc s e e th e w o rk o f a rt d e h u m a n iz in g itself. free-
in g its e lf from in a n 's s ig n a tu re .'
1 1 S te p lıa n e L u p a s c o 's p u b lica tio n s s u c h a s 'E ııe rg ie et
P h e n o m e n e P s y c h iq u c '. S y n th is e , A p ril 1 9 5 5 . c u l-
m iııa tc d fo r c o n te m p o ra ry a rtists in S cience ct art
a bslrait. P a ris 1 9 6 3 .
1 2 M ich el T a p ie . P re fa ce . Vehemences confrontees. c x iı.
c a t.. G a le rie N in a D au sse t. P a ris 1 9 5 1 . re p ro d u ced
Sn V ic cn s 1 9 6 2 . p .4 1 .
r î T a p ie h a d c o m m c rc la l lln k s w ith th e S tu d io F a c h e tü
g a lle ry vvhich h eld th e shovv t h a t a c c o m p a n ie d the
p u b lica tio n o f U11 art autre, o û il s 'a g iı de nouveaux
d tvidages du reel, P a r is 1 9 5 2 .
1 4 M ich el T ap ie. ‘ [a ck so n P ollo ck a v c c n o u s '. p refa c e
fo r th e o n c -ın a n shovv at th e S tu d io P a ch e ttl. P a ris.
Keb. 1 9 5 2 . re p ro d u c e d in V lce n s 1 9 6 2 . p .4 4 .
15 Fo r T a p ic ’ s C c n trc in T u rin s e e V ic en s 1 9 6 2 .
p p .2 5 8 - 9 .
16 U m b crto Kco jo in cd G iu lo C a r lo A r g a n (vvho vvrote
‘ D a B erg so n a F a u trie r'. fo r A ut A ut. Ja n . 19 6 0 ) .
R e n a to B nrilli a n d Hnrico C risp o ltl, fo r t h e s p c c ia l
n u m b e r o f 11 Verri d evo ted to th e In forıncl in Ju n e
19 6 1. Pzro's p lu riv a le n c y vvas ta k e n u p b y C rispoltl
in 1 9 7 1 . vvhen th e su b title fo r L T nforntale. sto rla e
l>oetica vvas ’ A b stra c t-B x p rc ssio n ism . A b stra etio n -
L y riq u e . A c tio n -P a in tin g . A rt A u t r e . A rt B rü t. A u to -
m a tism o . G e sto . In fo rm a le . N evv-D ada. N u ctö a rism e .
S p a z ia lism o . T a c h ism c ' (sic).
1 7 H en ri M ic h a u v . Un barbare en a sle. P a ris 1 9 3 3 .
p p .ı5 6 . 1 6 0.
1 8 S e e B c n ja m in P e rc t'ş a rtic le s: ‘ D 'u n e d e c a lc o m a n ic
s a n s o b je t p re c o n ç u '. M lnotaurc. ııo .S . 1 9 3 6 .
pp. 1 8 - 2 3 . a nd 'R u in c s : R u in c s d e s n ıirie s ' vvith a
fu ll-p a g e V lcto r H u g o in k vvaslı - h o m a g c to th e
g re a t p r c c u r s o r - M inotaure. M a y 1 9 3 9 . P - S 8 . T h e
R o rs c h a c h test vvas p u b lish ed (vvithout p la te s). P a ris
19 4 7 . S e c a ls o E m ile M ale sp in e . 'ü ı P e iııtu re in le g -
r a lc ’ . C ah iers d 'A r i. n o .2 2 . 1 9 4 7 . P P .2 S 8 - 9 2 . vvith
d c c a lc o m a n ia s. q u o tc s b y lic o n a rd o a n d R o rs c h a c h .
a n d F ra n ç o ls e M in k ovvsk a.
1 9 H e n ri M ic lıa u x . 'V itesse e t te m p o ', Q uadrum . 111.
19 5 6 . p . ı 6.
2 0 M ich el T a p ie . 'Ja c k so n P ollo ck a v e c n o u s '. re p ro ­
d u c ed in V icen s 1 9 6 2 . p .4 4 .
2 1 S e e P ie rre R e s ta n y . 'I/ A r t in fo rm e l et I c s c c h a n g c s
P a r l s - f o k y o ’ . 'A n t h o lo g ie '. in Le Japon des avaııt-
gardes. 1 9 T 0 - T 9 7 0 . c x h . c a t.. M u see n a tio n a le d 'a rt
m o d e rn e . C en tre G e o rg e s P om p id o u . P a ris 1 9 8 6 .
pp. 2 6 2 - 8 3.
2 2 M ich el R a g o n . L a P ein lu re actu elle. P a ris 1 9 5 9 . a
h ig h ly re p re s e n ta tiv c te x t o f th e p eriod. T h e 'A v a n t
p ro p o s'. p .3 ın e n t io n s a n ‘ a n t h o lo g y ’ o f Ja p a n e s e a rt
f 52]
shovvn in P a ris in c x c h a n g e fo r a se le c tlo n o f L o u v re
m a ste rp ie ce s. ‘ L es In flu e n ce s etraııg eres* is c e r ta in ly
n ot c h a u v in is t ic a s a s c c tio n . m e n tio n ln g tlıe R u s-
sia n a n d G e rm a n a v a n t-g a rd e s , q u a s h e d b y to ta lltar-
ia n is m th a t s e n t to P a ris a b e v y o f a rtists (in elu d in g
th o se from p o st-1 9 4 5 E a stc rn E u rop e). T h e ir nevv
ta le n ts a n d id e a s ‘ allovv P a ris, stili to d a y to vvith stan d
cffo rtle ssly co m p ctitio n vvith Nevv Y o rk , vvh ich c a ıı-
v a ss e s fo r s u c c e ssio ıı a s e x e m p la ry c u lt u ra l c ity '.
p .2 7 .
2 3 ’ U ot P a in t fo r C old W a r‘ vvas th e title o f th e 1 9 8 6
s y m p o siu m at tlıc U n iv e rsity o f B ritish C ö lu m b ia .
C a ııa d a . vvh ich g a v c risc to S e rg e G u llb a u t's p u b li­
c a tio n o f 1 9 9 0 .
X The Return of the Represscd: Revisioning
Paris Post VVar
t S e e S e rg e G u llb a u t (cd .). Reconstructing M odern isin:
A rt in N e w York. P a ris a n d M ontreal. 1 9 4 5 - 1 9 6 4 .
C a m b rid g c. M a s sa c h u s se tts a n d L o n d o n T 9 9 0 .
2 İn Ja n . 1 9 4 5 S a rtre . re p re se n tin g th e J o u r n a l Com bat
left to sp e n d s e v c ra l m o n th s in th e U nited S ta te s .
T iıirty -tvvo a rtic le s o n A m e ric a fo r Le I'igaro an d
Combat a r e listed in M ich e l C o n ta t a n d M ich el
R y b a lk a . L es K crits dc Sartre. P a ris 1 9 7 0 , p p .r 1 7 2 j .
S e e u lso U s Temps M odern es. n o s. r 1 - 1 2 . A u g .-S c p t .
19 4 6 . sp e c ial n u m b e r 011 th e U nited Sta tes, a n d
S im o n e d e B e a u v o ir L'A m eriqu e a ıı jo ıır le jo u r. Paris
1 9 4 8 . ( o rig in a lly scrialise d in U s Tem ps M odernes).
3 lro n ic a lly . th e e x p a tria tc Jic lio n h elp ed h is p atro n
A lb c rt E. G a lla tin c o n stitu te sın im p o rta n t c o n stru c ti-
vist a n d a b s tr a c t c o lle ctio n in Nevv Y o rk d u r in g the
1 9 3 0 S . S e e P ie rre A rn o u ld . ‘ H6İİ011 c t G a lla tin . les
e c h a n g e s e n tre l'F.u rop e e t le s E ta ts-U ııis'. X X V III
In ternational C ongress o f A rt llis to ria n s B erlin . Ju ly
1 9 9 2 (A b s tra c ts. p p . 3 0 - ] ).
4 I Jc lio n c o n firm c d to th e a u t h o r th a t lıc h a d seen
R o g e r B liıı’s F n A tteııdant G o do l in Ja n . 1 9 5 3 . See
S a rn h W llso n . 'D o ııb lc R h y th n ı: F a ııfa re fo r U clio n '.
in lle lio n . c x h . c a t.. A lb e rm a rle G o lle r)' 1 9 8 7 . p. 1 1 .
3 S e e P. B u to ıı a n d L G c rv c rc a u (eds.). U Coııteau
e n ire les den iş. P a ris 1 9 8 9 . a n d fo r th e A m e ric a n
fiıın n cin g o f Paix et liberte, F ra n ç o is Fonveille-
A lq u ie r. La i İr and e P e ıır d e l'aprâs-guerre. P a ris 1 9 7 3 .
p p .2 2 6 - 8 .
6 T a p ie . p re fa c e to tlıe M ath ie u c x h ib itio ıı. G a lerie
R lv c D roitc. P a ris 1 9 5 4 . in V ic cn s 1 9 6 2 . p . 1 5 1 .
7 VV'hilc c e r ta in ly c o n trib u tin g to th e 'A m c ric a n i-
s a t io ıı' o f E u ro p e. th e c h a r g e o f C .I.A . fu n d in g for
th ese e.vh ibitlons. p ron ıo tcd b y re p u b lic a tio n s o f Kvn
C o c k ro ft's In a c c u r a te 'A b s t ra c t E x p re ssio n ism .
VVeapoıı o f th e Cold W ar* (A rtforu m . v o l. r 2 . 1 1 0 . 1 o .
Ju n e 1 9 7 4 - PP- 3 9 - 4 1 ) h a s been r a d ic a lly c h a lle n g e d
b y S ta c )' T e n e n b a u m . ’ A D ia le c tic al P retzel; T h e Nevv
A m e ric a n P a in tin g . th e M u seu m o f M o d ern A rt an d
A m e ric a n C u ltu ra l D iplo m acy". u n p u b lis h e d M .A .
th esis. C o u riu u ld In stitu tc o f A rt. Lo n don T 9 9 2 .
8 S e c L a u r ic J . M o n a h a n . 'C u ltu r a l C a r to g ra p h y :
A m e ric a n D e sig n s a t th e 1 9 6 4 V e n ice B ic n n alc * . in
G u ilb a u t 1 9 9 0 . p p .3 6 9 ~ 4 i 6 .
9 R o b e rt Lcbel. P rem ier bilan de l'a rt a clu cl, P a ris 1 9 5 3 .
1 0 S e e J . O u e va l a n d J. T h c v c n o t. U Television. P a ris
19 5 7 . a n d B c n o S tc rn b c rg a ııd E v e ly ııe S ıılle ro t.
A specls sociaux de la radio e l de la tehfvision. Con-
flu en ce. ıv . P a ris 1 9 6 6 .
1 1 S e e P a sc a l O ry. 'P e u t-o ıı p a r le r d 'u n e g e n e ra tio n
d ’a p rö s-g u c rrc ? '. in P a tric k M a rsh (ed.). The Con-
selence o f the F rench . 1 9 9 3 (fo rth c o m ln g ) fo r th e
p e rio d isa lio n p rob lem . R e g a rd itıg re tro s p e c liv e re a d -
İn g s, B e r n a r d D o riv al İn L es F.tapes de la nouvelle pein -
türe contem porainc. P a ris 1 9 4 4 . o r R e n e H u y g h c . La
P ein lu re fran çaise contem poralne. P a ris 1 9 4 9 savv the
(F rc ııc h ) S c h o o l o f P a ris a s d o m in a n t: th e p a in te r.
G e o rg e s M a th ie u c a lle d th e p eriod 1 9 4 4 - 5 1 'l.'O ffen-
s iv e a n tig c o m e triq u c ' in h is m e m o lrs. a n d c e r ta in ly
g e o m e tric a b s tru c t a r t vvas u b iq u ito u s, Icnd iug to
C h a rle s H stien n e's p a m p h lc t: L 'A r i abstrait est-U un
academ icism c?. P a ris 1 9 5 0 . T h e d istin g u ish c d his-
to rla n P a sc a l O ry c o n s ta n tly d c c la rc s th a t S u rre a lism
vvas th e d o m in a n t p h e ııo m e n o n o f th e e p o q u c (O ry.
L 'A v eııtu re culturelle fran çaise, 1 9 4 5 - i 9 8 9 . P a ris
1 9 8 9 . p p .ı 3 4 et seq .). vvlıilst S e rg e G u ilb a u t c la im s
th a t S o c ia lis t R e a lism 'm o n o p o llse d th e d isc o u rse on
a rt u n til 1 9 5 3 ’ in "Postvvar P a in tin g G a m c s: T h e
R o ııg h a n d th e S lic k '. in G u ilb a u t 1 9 9 0 . p .4 4 . ig ııo r-
in g th e e v id e n c c o f th e P a ris-P aris e x h . c a t.. M u s£c
n a tio n a l d 'a rt m o d e rn e . C cn trc G e o rg e s P om pid ou .
P a ris 1 9 S 1 (rc-cdited 19 9 2 ) - T h is selc c tio n in itself
c x c lu d e d th e S a lo n d c la Je u n e P e in tu rc a rtists . let
a lo ııe p a in tin g re p re s e n ta tiv c o f th e P a ris ia n S a lo n s
o r E c o lc d es B c a u x -A r ts n o rm s.
1 2 S c c Y v e - A la in B o is 's s a r c a s m s in 'P a in tin g a s M odel'.
Painting a s M odel. C a m b rid g e . M a s sa c h u s se tts 1 9 9 0 .
p .2 4 6 . T h e trad itio n o f th e p h ilo so p lıe r v vritin g on
a rt c o ııtin u c s: s e e Ja c q u e s D e rrid a 's M em oires d a v e ti-
gle. P a ris 1 9 9 0 .
13 S e e. fo r e.vam ple. a s re g a rd s M a lra u x . R o saltn d
K ra u s s. ' l e M u se e s a n s m u rs d u p o stm o d ern ism e '.
C ahiers d u M usee N ational d 'A rt M o d em e (P aris),
n o s. 1 7 - 1 8 . 1 9 8 6 . p p .ı 5 2 - 8 .