La lunette farcie

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La lunette farcie

Artist Jean Dubuffet (French, 1901-1985)

Publisher PAB, [Pierre André Benoit], Alès and Paris, 1963

Printer lithographs: Jean Dubuffet, [s.l.]; text: l’Imprimerie Union, Paris

Author Jean Dubuffet (French, 1901-1985)

Date1963

DimensionsPortfolio: H: 17 3/4 in. (451 mm); W: 15 9/16 in. (395 mm); Depth: 1/2 in. (12 mm).
Book: H: 17 9/16 in. (446 mm); W: 15 1/2 in. (393 mm); Depth: 3/16 in. (5 mm).
Page (untrimmed): H: 17 1/16 in. (434 mm); W: 15 1/16 in. (382 mm).

MediumOriginal prints: 10 lithographs in colors, plus 1 in black (wrappers). Text: relief line block reproductions of rubber-stamped text. Paper: Arches ivory wove.

ClassificationBooks

Credit LineGift of Molly and Walter Bareiss

Object number

1984.423

Not on View

Label TextJean Dubuffet, La lunette farcie. Text by Jean Dubuffet (1963) This is the first of four books Jean Dubuffet created with publisher Pierre André Benoit (PAB). In 1962, Dubuffet submitted a booklet with his own hand-written text and 10 little oil paintings pasted onto the pages. The process of converting this manuscript into a book caused Benoit to break from his usual miniature format in order to preserve Dubuffet’s vision as much as possible. (See other PAB books in the Publisher’s Vision section of this exhibition.) Benoit considered a variety of methods for reproducing the text. At Dubuffet’s urging, he settled on rubber-stamped letters. The result was so pleasing that they used rubber letters for three of their four books. La lunette farcie literally translates as “Stuffed Glasses,” but is also a pun on “The Moon is Full.” The book is written in a sort of jargon that Dubuffet invented in an effort to “renovate writing.” The oil paintings of the original booklet were replaced with lithographs that used some of the plates that Dubuffet had created for his project Phénomènes. This was a series of textural lithographs created by printing a succession of zinc plates in different colors and combinations. Mr. and Mrs. Bareiss’s collection includes the Phénomènes series as well as 32 other projects with original prints by Dubuffet.Published Referencescf. Castleman, Riva, A Century of Artists' Books, New York, 1984, p. 153, col. repr.Exhibition HistoryToledo Museum of Art, The Bareiss Collection of Modern Illustrated Books from Toulouse-Lautrec to Kiefer, 1985, no. 25

Toledo Museum of Art, Work in Progress: Cataloguing books, 1985 (no cat.)

Nelson-Atkins Museum, Kansas City, Missouri. 1989.

Toledo Museum of Art, Splendid Pages: The Molly and Walter Bareiss Collection of Modern Illustrated Books, Feb. 14--May 11, 2003.