this one isn't in the book, but a segment from one of my favourites
Reading this hardback on the love triangle between Max Ernst , Gala and Paul Eluard and how their jaunts off to the far eastern corners of the globe inspired some of Ernst’s most enduring and haunting abstracts – Lots of post analytical comparisons between travelogue photos of the time and his paintings – so plenty of oh yeah moments to be had. The writing isn’t bad either, avoiding the monotony of staid thesaurus swallowing, for text that actually goes somewhere. Of course the stunning artwork is the real attention grabber with some work I’ve never seen before, which considering the man’s vast output isn’t surprising. One of those books you flick through for a moment and lose an hour or two - true time recovery.
Funnily enough I’ve been an Ernst devotee since I accidentally found a book on him in a library in the 80’s, a huge dusty tome which smelt of decay. Have a memory of mouthing the German text as my eyes ran the textured surface of the full colour plates, head soaked with exotic and wondrous explorations - smelling my hands afterwards. It’s a pity that I’ve never actually seen the canvases in the flesh, maybe one day.
Comments
as i think is obvious :)