Lost Body (Corps perdu)
Artist: Pablo Picasso (Spanish (active France), 1881-1973)
Publisher: Éditions fragrance, Paris, 1950
Printer: plates: Roger Lacourière, [Paris]; text: Pierre Boucher, [Paris]
Author: Aimé Césaire (French, 1913–2008)
Date: 1950
Dimensions:
Slipcase: H: 16 1/4 in. (413 mm); W: 11 3/4 in. (299 mm); Depth: 2 11/16 in. (68 mm).
Chemise: H: 15 13/16 in. (401 mm); W: 11 5/8 in. (295 mm); Depth: 2 1/4 in. (57 mm).
Book: H: 15 1/2 in. (394 mm); W: 11 1/4 in. (286 mm); Depth: 2 in. (51 mm).
Page (untrimmed): H: 15 1/2 in. (394 mm); W: 11 1/4 in. (286 mm).
Medium: Original prints: 20 engravings, 10 lift ground aquatints, 1 drypoint, and 1 etching (wrapper front).
Text: letterpress (typeface: Érasme).
Paper: Montval cream wove, watermarked with "Corps perdu" in Picasso's script.
Classification: Books
Credit Line: Gift of Molly and Walter Bareiss in honor of Barbara K. Sutherland
Object number: 1984.899
Label Text:In 1941 André Breton and the Cuban painter Wilfredo Lam made a trip to the West Indies, where they discovered the black poet Aimé Césaire. This book is an anthology of ten of his poems, the title coming from the fifth poem, and they all deal in some way with the quest for black identity. Picasso illustrated each poem with two engravings, depicting his visualization of tropical plants, insects, pictographic coupling, and faces in the form of leaves, animals or cresent moons. The title of each poem is surrounded by an aquatint; the frontispiece is an image of a black man's head (supposedly the author) in profile; and the cover etching are the words of the title surrounded by vegetation arranged in the shape of a heart.
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In Collection(s)