This surrealist painter and sculptor, master of Dadism, friend of André Breton (who lived for a while at the Hôtel des Grands Hommes) is honoured by a new exhibition at the Musée d’Orsay (before it goes on to Hamburg and Madrid). The images shown are quite surprising, and much imitated to this day (here, for example)…

2008After 1850, sensational images were to be found everywhere: in books and magazines, and newspapers and advertisements of every sort.
Born in 1891, Max Ernst was a child of this revolution. He took advantage of his culture and visual memories in 1933 deciding, when the Surrealist movement was at its height, to use a number of old illustrations for his own purposes.

He used Sade and Fantômas, Doré and Grandville as sources as well as the covers of detective stories. The book that came out of this brilliant plundering in 1936 — without text and consisted of one part for each day of the week — clearly shows how the 20th century took inspiration from its predecessor.

A talk entitled “The splendid 19th Century of the Surrealists: heritage and misappropriation” will be held on 25th and 26th June in the museum auditorium, with Dario Gamboni of Geneva University and Werner Spies, curator of the exhibition.

The exhibition Max Ernst “A Week of Kindness”, the original collages (Max Ernst “Une semaine de bonté”. Les collages originaux”) runs from 30th June – 13th September at the Musée d’Orsay. Official site here. Map here. Open every day from 9.30am – 6pm (and until 9.45pm Thursdays) except Monday. Admission 8€/5.50€. Free for under 26 year-olds.