40 - René CHAR. Le Marteau sans maître.
See original version (French)

Estimate €7,000 - €8,000

Description

René CHAR. *Le Marteau sans maître*. Paris, Le Vent d’Arles, 1976. Folio, loose-leaf, decorated grey paper cover with embossed design, publisher’s box in red half-basane. A large illustrated book featuring 23 original colour etchings and aquatints by Joan Miró, eight of which are double-page spreads. A single edition of 215 copies printed on large-format Arches vellum, signed by the poet and the artist (no. 91). A partnership with Miró “No painter was more frequently associated with René Char’s poems than Joan Miró: from 1948 to 1976, four illustrated books, a dozen or so more modest collaborations, not to mention the ‘illuminated’ manuscripts […]. Miró could never refuse his friends anything, especially when it came to Char, for whom he very quickly developed a complete, though silent, admiration. […] This relationship, though seemingly devoid of dialogue, was no less profound. They both took pleasure in working together: Miró was a true reader of poetry, and in 1963 Char wrote, in reference to Miró’s painting, the most elaborate of his texts on art, describing Miró’s work as a ‘gravitation towards the sources’, ‘the first spark in the infancy of time’. We find this playful joy in almost all the books or manuscripts to which the painter was invited” (Antoine Coron). Mir took two years to complete the engravings for the plates of *Le Marteau sans maître*. (Coron, René Char, BnF, 2007, p. 178 and no. 295.—Cramer, Joan Miró: Illustrated Books, no. 216.—Dupin, MirEngraver, IV, 944–966.)

See original version (French)

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About the sale Henri Michaux, the Sven Pitsey collection

Auction location

Auction time 10/29/2026 at 2:00 PM

Pictures credits: Contact the Auction House

40 - René CHAR. *Le Marteau sans maître*. See original version (French)

40 - René CHAR. Le Marteau sans maître.
See original version (French)