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111
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MAN RAY & Paul ÉLUARD. *Les Mains libres*.
See original version (French)
111
-
MAN RAY & Paul ÉLUARD. *Les Mains libres*.
See original version (French)
Estimate €2,500 - €3,000
Voluntary lot
Description
MAN RAY & Paul ÉLUARD. *Les Mains libres*. Drawings illustrated by the poems of Paul Éluard.
Paris, Éditions Jeanne Bucher, 1937. In-4: brick-red half-maroquin with small corners, smooth spine, untrimmed, gilt head, illustrated cover and spine preserved, slipcase (P.-L. Martin, 1963).
First edition: this volume showcases the artist Man Ray and marks his second collaboration with Éluard following *Facile* (1935). Limited edition of 675 copies: one of the 650 printed on Chester laid paper (no. 290).
67 full-page reproductions of Man Ray’s drawings, including a frontispiece. Man Ray also designed the title, which appears on the cover.
54 of these drawings are accompanied by poems by Paul Éluard. (Jeanne Bucher, an avant-garde gallery 1925–1946 from Max Ernst to de Staël, 1994, p. 112, no. XIX.)
Autograph dedication signed on the half-title page: to
A. J. Gonon / his friend, / Paul Éluard
This book has superb provenance, having belonged to a close friend of Éluard’s who affectionately nicknamed him ‘Ajigé’: Alphonse-Jules Gonon was not only one of the poet’s – and a few other Surrealists’ – regular bookbinders, but also a publisher to whom we owe one of Éluard’s earliest publications, *Le Devoir et l’Inquiétude*, in 1917.
A fine copy in which four autograph poems by Éluard have been bound, each mounted on a tab opposite the printed text:
Plante-aux-Oiseaux (eight lines, page 109); Avignon (two lines, page 121); Des nuages dans les mains (ten lines, page 133) and Feu d’artifice (two lines, page 151).
See original version (French)
Auto-translation. Refer to original language for legal validity.
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
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