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Cadastre (Phénomènes, no. 5, color series)
Artist: Jean Dubuffet (French, 1901-1985)
Publisher: Jean Dubuffet, [Paris], 1960
Printer: lithographs: Jean Dubuffet, [Paris]; text: l’Imprimerie Fequet et Baudier, Paris
Date: 1960
Dimensions:
Box: H: 26 3/16 in. (665 mm); W: 18 9/16 in. (471 mm); Depth: 1 1/8 in. (29 mm).
Page (untrimmed): H: 25 in. (635 mm); W: 17 7/8 in. (454 mm).
Leaf (untrimmed): H: 25 in. (635 mm); W: 17 7/8 in. (454 mm).
Medium: Original prints: 10 lithographs in colors.
Text: letterpress (typeface: Futura).
Paper: Arches cream wove paper, watermarked.
Classification: Prints
Credit Line: Gift of Molly and Walter Bareiss
Object number: 1984.413
Label Text:Widely regarded as the most important French artist to emerge at the end of World War II, Jean Dubuffet was famous for promoting “l’Art Brut” (“Brutal Art”). Like the art of children or of the mentally ill, Art Brut looked untutored, full of vitality, and often irresistible in its directness—“art at its purest and crudest,” according to Dubuffet. However, the artist’s contempt for aesthetic and academic conventions did not preclude the creation of (perhaps unintentionally) beautiful works of art, like his series of portfolios of 324 lithographs, Les Phénomènes (The Phenomena), created from 1958 to 1962.
Dubuffet drew inspiration from soil, sand, stones and rock, pavement, walls, rusty metals, decaying substances, vegetation, mist, and dust. He sometimes even mixed actual organic matter with his lithographer’s ink. But the resulting lithographs do not depict any texture in particular. Rather, they evoke the sense of a texture, and the title for each print was prompted by what sensation of mood or effect the image might call to mind. Les Phénomènes is thus an impressive, abstract encyclopedia of sorts, both recording and provoking awe for the world’s minute details and surface patterns.
Dubuffet drew inspiration from soil, sand, stones and rock, pavement, walls, rusty metals, decaying substances, vegetation, mist, and dust. He sometimes even mixed actual organic matter with his lithographer’s ink. But the resulting lithographs do not depict any texture in particular. Rather, they evoke the sense of a texture, and the title for each print was prompted by what sensation of mood or effect the image might call to mind. Les Phénomènes is thus an impressive, abstract encyclopedia of sorts, both recording and provoking awe for the world’s minute details and surface patterns.
Not on view
In Collection(s)