Max Ernst
Encyclopedia
Max Ernst was a German painter
, sculptor, graphic artist, and poet
. A prolific artist, Ernst was one of the primary pioneers of the Dada
movement and Surrealism
.
, near Cologne
, the third of nine children of a middle-class Catholic family. His father Philipp Ernst was a teacher of the deaf and dumb and an amateur painter. A devout Christian and a strict disciplinarian, he inspired in his son a penchant for defying authority, while his interest in painting and sketching in nature influenced Max Ernst to take up painting himself. In 1909 Ernst enrolled in the University of Bonn
, studying philosophy, art history, literature, psychology and psychiatry. He visited asylums and became fascinated with the art of the mentally ill patients; he also started painting this year, producing sketches in the garden of the Brühl castle and portraits of his sister and himself. In 1911 Ernst befriended August Macke
and joined his Die Rheinischen Expressionisten group of artists, deciding to become an artist. In 1912 he visited the Sonderbund exhibition in Cologne, where works by Pablo Picasso
and post-Impressionists such as Vincent Van Gogh
and Paul Gauguin
profoundly influenced his approach to art. His own work was exhibited the same year together with that of the Das Junge Rheinland group, at Galerie Feldman in Cologne, and then in several group exhibitions in 1913.
In 1914 Ernst met Hans Arp in Cologne. The two soon became friends and their relationship lasted for fifty years. After Ernst completed his studies in the summer, his life was interrupted by World War I
. Ernst was drafted and served both on the Western and the Eastern front. Such was the devastating effect of the war on the artist that in his autobiography he referred to his time in the army thus: "On the first of August 1914 M[ax].E[rnst]. died. He was resurrected on the eleventh of November 1918." However, for a brief period on the Western front, Ernst's position was charting maps, which allowed him to continue painting. Several German Expressionist painters died in action during the war, among them Macke and Franz Marc
.
Ernst was demobilized in 1918 and returned to Cologne. He soon married art history student Luise Straus, whom he met in 1914. Next year Ernst visited Paul Klee
in Munich
and studied paintings by Giorgio de Chirico
, which left a deep impression on him. The same year, inspired partly by de Chirico and partly by studying mail-order catalogues, teaching-aide manuals, and similar sources, he produced his first collage
s (notably Fiat modes, a portfolio of lithographs), a technique which would come to dominate his artistic pursuits in the years to come. Also in 1919 Ernst, social activist Johannes Theodor Baargeld
, and a number of their friends and colleagues founded the Cologne Dada
group. In 1919–20 Ernst and Baargeld published various short-lived magazines such as Der Strom and die schammade and organized Dada exhibitions.
Ernst's son Ulrich 'Jimmy' Ernst
was born on 24 June 1920. He went on to become a painter like his father, but Ernst's marriage to Luise was short-lived. In 1921 he met Paul Éluard
, who became a close lifelong friend. Éluard bought two of Ernst's paintings (Celebes and Oedipus Rex) and selected six collages to illustrate his poetry collection Répétitions. A year later the two collaborated on Les malheurs des immortels, and then, with André Breton
whom Ernst met in 1921, on the magazine Litterature. In 1922, unable to secure the necessary papers, Ernst entered France illegally and settled into a ménage à trois
with the Éluards in Paris suburb Saint-Brice, leaving behind his wife and son. During his first two years in Paris Ernst took various odd jobs to make a living and continued to paint. In 1923 the Éluards moved to a new home in Eaubonne
, near Paris, where Ernst painted numerous mural
s. The same year his works were exhibited at Salon des Indépendants.
Although apparently accepting the ménage à trois at first, Éluard eventually became more concerned about the affair. In 1924 he abruptly left, first for Monaco
, and then for Saigon, Vietnam
. He soon asked his wife and Max Ernst to join him; both had to sell numerous paintings to finance the trip. Ernst went to Düsseldorf and sold a large number of his works to a longtime friend, Johanna Ey
, owner of gallery Das Junge Rheinland. After a brief time together in Saigon, the trio decided that Gala would remain with Paul. The Éluards returned to Eaubonne in early September, while Ernst followed them some months later, after exploring more of South-East Asia. He returned to Paris in late 1924 and soon signed a contract with Jacques Viot that allowed him to paint full time. In 1925 Ernst established a studio at 22, rue Touralque.
Constantly experimenting, in 1925 he invented a graphic art technique called frottage (see Surrealist techniques
), which uses pencil rubbings of objects as a source of images. He also created another technique called 'grattage' in which paint is scraped across canvas to reveal the imprints of the objects placed beneath. He uses this technique in his famous painting Forest and Dove
(as shown at the Tate Modern).
The next year he collaborated with Joan Miró
on designs for Sergei Diaghilev
. With Miró's help, Ernst pioneered grattage in which he troweled pigment from his canvases. He also explored with the technique of decalcomania
which involves pressing paint between two surfaces.
Ernst developed a fascination with birds that was prevalent in his work. His alter ego in paintings, which he called Loplop
, was a bird. He suggested that this alter-ego was an extension of himself stemming from an early confusion of birds and humans. He said that one night when he was young he woke up and found that his beloved bird had died, and a few minutes later his father announced that his sister was born. Loplop often appeared in collages of other artists' work, such as Loplop presents André Breton. Ernst drew a great deal of controversy with his 1926 painting The Virgin Chastises the infant Jesus before Three Witnesses: André Breton, Paul Éluard, and the Painter. In 1927 he married Marie-Berthe Aurenche, and it is thought his relationship with her may have inspired the erotic subject matter of The Kiss and other works of this year. In 1930, he appeared in the film L'Âge d'Or
, directed by self-identifying Surrealist Luis Buñuel
. Ernst began to make sculpture in 1934, and spent time with Alberto Giacometti
. In 1938, the American heiress and artistic patron
Peggy Guggenheim
acquired a number of Max Ernst's works which she displayed in her new museum in London. Ernst and Peggy Guggenheim were also married to one another from 1942 to 1946.
In 1938 he was interned in Camp des Milles
, near Aix-en-Provence
, along with fellow surrealist, Hans Bellmer
, who had recently emigrated to Paris on the outbreak of World War II. Thanks to the intercession of Paul Éluard
and other friends, including the journalist Varian Fry
, he was discharged a few weeks later. Soon after the Nazi occupation of France, he was arrested again, this time by the Gestapo, but managed to escape and flee to America with the help of Guggenheim. He left behind his lover, Leonora Carrington
, and she suffered a major mental breakdown. Ernst and Guggenheim arrived in the United States in 1941 and were married the following year. Along with other artists and friends (Marcel Duchamp
and Marc Chagall
) who had fled from the war and lived in New York City, Ernst helped inspire the development of Abstract expressionism
.
His marriage to Guggenheim did not last, and in Beverly Hills, California
in October 1946, in a double ceremony with Man Ray
and Juliet P. Browner, he married Dorothea Tanning
. The couple first made their home in Sedona, Arizona
. In 1948 Ernst wrote the treatise Beyond Painting. As a result of the publicity, he began to achieve financial success.
In 1953 he and Tanning moved to a small town in the south of France where he continued to work. The City, and the Galeries Nationales du Grand-Palais in Paris published a complete catalogue of his works.
In 1966 he created a chess set made of glass which he named "Immortel"; it has been described by the poet André Verdet as "a masterpiece of bewitching magic, worthy of a Maya palace or the residence of a Pharaon".
Ernst died on 1 April 1976 in Paris. He was interred at the Père Lachaise Cemetery.
's 1991 documentary Max Ernst. Dedicated to the art historian Werner Spies
, it was assembled from interviews with Ernst, stills of his paintings and sculptures, and the memoirs of his wife Dorothea Tanning and son Jimmy. The 101-minute German film was released on DVD with English subtitles by Image Entertainment.
In 2005, "Max Ernst: A Retrospective" opened at the Metropolitan Museum of Art
and included works such as Celebes (1921), Ubu Imperator (1923), and Fireside Angel (1937), which is one of the few definitively political pieces and is sub-titled The Triumph of Surrealism depicting a raging bird-like creature that symbolizes the wave of fascism
that took over Europe. The exhibition also includes Ernst's works that experiment with free association writing and the techniques of frottage
, created from a rubbing from a textured surface; grattage, involving scratching at the surface of a painting; and decalcomania
, which involves altering a wet painting by pressing a second surface against it and taking it away.
Ernst's son Jimmy
, a well known German/American abstract expressionist painter, who lived on the south shore of Long Island
, died in 1984. His memoirs, A Not-So-Still Life, were published shortly before his death. His grandson Eric and granddaughter Amy are both artists and writers.
Painting
Painting is the practice of applying paint, pigment, color or other medium to a surface . The application of the medium is commonly applied to the base with a brush but other objects can be used. In art, the term painting describes both the act and the result of the action. However, painting is...
, sculptor, graphic artist, and poet
Poet
A poet is a person who writes poetry. A poet's work can be literal, meaning that his work is derived from a specific event, or metaphorical, meaning that his work can take on many meanings and forms. Poets have existed since antiquity, in nearly all languages, and have produced works that vary...
. A prolific artist, Ernst was one of the primary pioneers of the Dada
Dada
Dada or Dadaism is a cultural movement that began in Zurich, Switzerland, during World War I and peaked from 1916 to 1922. The movement primarily involved visual arts, literature—poetry, art manifestoes, art theory—theatre, and graphic design, and concentrated its anti-war politics through a...
movement and Surrealism
Surrealism
Surrealism is a cultural movement that began in the early 1920s, and is best known for the visual artworks and writings of the group members....
.
Early life
Ernst was born on April 2, 1891, in BrühlBrühl, North Rhine-Westphalia
Brühl is a town in the Rhineland of Germany. It is located in Rhein-Erft-Kreis, 20 km south of Cologne city center and at the edge of Naturpark Kottenforst-Ville Nature Reserve.-History:...
, near Cologne
Cologne
Cologne is Germany's fourth-largest city , and is the largest city both in the Germany Federal State of North Rhine-Westphalia and within the Rhine-Ruhr Metropolitan Area, one of the major European metropolitan areas with more than ten million inhabitants.Cologne is located on both sides of the...
, the third of nine children of a middle-class Catholic family. His father Philipp Ernst was a teacher of the deaf and dumb and an amateur painter. A devout Christian and a strict disciplinarian, he inspired in his son a penchant for defying authority, while his interest in painting and sketching in nature influenced Max Ernst to take up painting himself. In 1909 Ernst enrolled in the University of Bonn
University of Bonn
The University of Bonn is a public research university located in Bonn, Germany. Founded in its present form in 1818, as the linear successor of earlier academic institutions, the University of Bonn is today one of the leading universities in Germany. The University of Bonn offers a large number...
, studying philosophy, art history, literature, psychology and psychiatry. He visited asylums and became fascinated with the art of the mentally ill patients; he also started painting this year, producing sketches in the garden of the Brühl castle and portraits of his sister and himself. In 1911 Ernst befriended August Macke
August Macke
August Macke was one of the leading members of the German Expressionist group Der Blaue Reiter . He lived during a particularly innovative time for German art which saw the development of the main German Expressionist movements as well as the arrival of the successive avant-garde movements which...
and joined his Die Rheinischen Expressionisten group of artists, deciding to become an artist. In 1912 he visited the Sonderbund exhibition in Cologne, where works by Pablo Picasso
Pablo Picasso
Pablo Diego José Francisco de Paula Juan Nepomuceno María de los Remedios Cipriano de la Santísima Trinidad Ruiz y Picasso known as Pablo Ruiz Picasso was a Spanish expatriate painter, sculptor, printmaker, ceramicist, and stage designer, one of the greatest and most influential artists of the...
and post-Impressionists such as Vincent Van Gogh
Vincent van Gogh
Vincent Willem van Gogh , and used Brabant dialect in his writing; it is therefore likely that he himself pronounced his name with a Brabant accent: , with a voiced V and palatalized G and gh. In France, where much of his work was produced, it is...
and Paul Gauguin
Paul Gauguin
Eugène Henri Paul Gauguin was a leading French Post-Impressionist artist. He was an important figure in the Symbolist movement as a painter, sculptor, print-maker, ceramist, and writer...
profoundly influenced his approach to art. His own work was exhibited the same year together with that of the Das Junge Rheinland group, at Galerie Feldman in Cologne, and then in several group exhibitions in 1913.
In 1914 Ernst met Hans Arp in Cologne. The two soon became friends and their relationship lasted for fifty years. After Ernst completed his studies in the summer, his life was interrupted by World War I
World War I
World War I , which was predominantly called the World War or the Great War from its occurrence until 1939, and the First World War or World War I thereafter, was a major war centred in Europe that began on 28 July 1914 and lasted until 11 November 1918...
. Ernst was drafted and served both on the Western and the Eastern front. Such was the devastating effect of the war on the artist that in his autobiography he referred to his time in the army thus: "On the first of August 1914 M[ax].E[rnst]. died. He was resurrected on the eleventh of November 1918." However, for a brief period on the Western front, Ernst's position was charting maps, which allowed him to continue painting. Several German Expressionist painters died in action during the war, among them Macke and Franz Marc
Franz Marc
Franz Marc was a German painter and printmaker, one of the key figures of the German Expressionist movement...
.
Dada and surrealism
Paul Klee
Paul Klee was born in Münchenbuchsee, Switzerland, and is considered both a German and a Swiss painter. His highly individual style was influenced by movements in art that included expressionism, cubism, and surrealism. He was, as well, a student of orientalism...
in Munich
Munich
Munich The city's motto is "" . Before 2006, it was "Weltstadt mit Herz" . Its native name, , is derived from the Old High German Munichen, meaning "by the monks' place". The city's name derives from the monks of the Benedictine order who founded the city; hence the monk depicted on the city's coat...
and studied paintings by Giorgio de Chirico
Giorgio de Chirico
Giorgio de Chirico was a pre-Surrealist and then Surrealist Italian painter born in Volos, Greece, to a Genovese mother and a Sicilian father. He founded the scuola metafisica art movement...
, which left a deep impression on him. The same year, inspired partly by de Chirico and partly by studying mail-order catalogues, teaching-aide manuals, and similar sources, he produced his first collage
Collage
A collage is a work of formal art, primarily in the visual arts, made from an assemblage of different forms, thus creating a new whole....
s (notably Fiat modes, a portfolio of lithographs), a technique which would come to dominate his artistic pursuits in the years to come. Also in 1919 Ernst, social activist Johannes Theodor Baargeld
Johannes Theodor Baargeld
Johannes Theodor Baargeld was a pseudonym of Alfred Emanuel Ferdinand Grünwald , a German painter and poet who, together with Max Ernst, founded the Cologne Dada group. He also used the name Zentrodada in connection with Dada.Baargeld was born in Stettin , Prussian Pomerania. He studied...
, and a number of their friends and colleagues founded the Cologne Dada
Dada
Dada or Dadaism is a cultural movement that began in Zurich, Switzerland, during World War I and peaked from 1916 to 1922. The movement primarily involved visual arts, literature—poetry, art manifestoes, art theory—theatre, and graphic design, and concentrated its anti-war politics through a...
group. In 1919–20 Ernst and Baargeld published various short-lived magazines such as Der Strom and die schammade and organized Dada exhibitions.
Ernst's son Ulrich 'Jimmy' Ernst
Jimmy Ernst
Jimmy Ernst was an American painter born in Germany.-Early life:Jimmy Ernst was born in 1920 in Cologne, Germany, the son of surrealist painter Max Ernst and Luise Straus, a well-known art historian and journalist. His parents divorced in 1922 and Ernst staying with his mother in Cologne...
was born on 24 June 1920. He went on to become a painter like his father, but Ernst's marriage to Luise was short-lived. In 1921 he met Paul Éluard
Paul Éluard
Paul Éluard, born Eugène Émile Paul Grindel , was a French poet who was one of the founders of the surrealist movement.-Biography:...
, who became a close lifelong friend. Éluard bought two of Ernst's paintings (Celebes and Oedipus Rex) and selected six collages to illustrate his poetry collection Répétitions. A year later the two collaborated on Les malheurs des immortels, and then, with André Breton
André Breton
André Breton was a French writer and poet. He is known best as the founder of Surrealism. His writings include the first Surrealist Manifesto of 1924, in which he defined surrealism as "pure psychic automatism"....
whom Ernst met in 1921, on the magazine Litterature. In 1922, unable to secure the necessary papers, Ernst entered France illegally and settled into a ménage à trois
Ménage à trois
Ménage à trois is a French term which originally described a domestic arrangement in which three people having sexual relations occupy the same household – the phrase literally translates as "household of three"...
with the Éluards in Paris suburb Saint-Brice, leaving behind his wife and son. During his first two years in Paris Ernst took various odd jobs to make a living and continued to paint. In 1923 the Éluards moved to a new home in Eaubonne
Eaubonne
Eaubonne is a commune in the northern suburbs of Paris, France. It is located from the center of Paris.-Twin towns:It is twinned with Matlock, Derbyshire, England, Budenheim, Germany and Vălenii de Munte, Romania.-Transport:...
, near Paris, where Ernst painted numerous mural
Mural
A mural is any piece of artwork painted or applied directly on a wall, ceiling or other large permanent surface. A particularly distinguishing characteristic of mural painting is that the architectural elements of the given space are harmoniously incorporated into the picture.-History:Murals of...
s. The same year his works were exhibited at Salon des Indépendants.
Although apparently accepting the ménage à trois at first, Éluard eventually became more concerned about the affair. In 1924 he abruptly left, first for Monaco
Monaco
Monaco , officially the Principality of Monaco , is a sovereign city state on the French Riviera. It is bordered on three sides by its neighbour, France, and its centre is about from Italy. Its area is with a population of 35,986 as of 2011 and is the most densely populated country in the...
, and then for Saigon, Vietnam
Vietnam
Vietnam – sometimes spelled Viet Nam , officially the Socialist Republic of Vietnam – is the easternmost country on the Indochina Peninsula in Southeast Asia. It is bordered by China to the north, Laos to the northwest, Cambodia to the southwest, and the South China Sea –...
. He soon asked his wife and Max Ernst to join him; both had to sell numerous paintings to finance the trip. Ernst went to Düsseldorf and sold a large number of his works to a longtime friend, Johanna Ey
Johanna Ey
Johanna Ey was an art dealer in Germany during the 1920s. She became known as Mutter Ey for the nurturing support she provided to her artists, who included Max Ernst and Otto Dix.-Biography:...
, owner of gallery Das Junge Rheinland. After a brief time together in Saigon, the trio decided that Gala would remain with Paul. The Éluards returned to Eaubonne in early September, while Ernst followed them some months later, after exploring more of South-East Asia. He returned to Paris in late 1924 and soon signed a contract with Jacques Viot that allowed him to paint full time. In 1925 Ernst established a studio at 22, rue Touralque.
Constantly experimenting, in 1925 he invented a graphic art technique called frottage (see Surrealist techniques
Surrealist techniques
Surrealism in art, poetry, and literature uses numerous techniques and games to provide inspiration. Many of these are said to free imagination by producing a creative process free of conscious control. The importance of the unconscious as a source of inspiration is central to the nature of...
), which uses pencil rubbings of objects as a source of images. He also created another technique called 'grattage' in which paint is scraped across canvas to reveal the imprints of the objects placed beneath. He uses this technique in his famous painting Forest and Dove
Forest and Dove
Forest and Dove is a painting by the German surrealist Max Ernst. It depicts a nocturnal scene of a forest of bizarre, abstract trees. In the thick of the forest is a child-like depiction of a dove....
(as shown at the Tate Modern).
The next year he collaborated with Joan Miró
Joan Miró
Joan Miró i Ferrà was a Spanish Catalan painter, sculptor, and ceramicist born in Barcelona.Earning international acclaim, his work has been interpreted as Surrealism, a sandbox for the subconscious mind, a re-creation of the childlike, and a manifestation of Catalan pride...
on designs for Sergei Diaghilev
Sergei Diaghilev
Sergei Pavlovich Diaghilev , usually referred to outside of Russia as Serge, was a Russian art critic, patron, ballet impresario and founder of the Ballets Russes, from which many famous dancers and choreographers would arise.-Early life and career:...
. With Miró's help, Ernst pioneered grattage in which he troweled pigment from his canvases. He also explored with the technique of decalcomania
Decalcomania
Decalcomania, from the French décalcomanie, is a decorative technique by which engravings and prints may be transferred to pottery or other materials. It was invented in England about 1750 and imported into the United States at least as early as 1865...
which involves pressing paint between two surfaces.
Ernst developed a fascination with birds that was prevalent in his work. His alter ego in paintings, which he called Loplop
Loplop
Loplop is the name of a birdlike character featured in prints, collages and paintings by artist Max Ernst. Loplop was an alter ego which Ernst developed and functioned as a familiar animal....
, was a bird. He suggested that this alter-ego was an extension of himself stemming from an early confusion of birds and humans. He said that one night when he was young he woke up and found that his beloved bird had died, and a few minutes later his father announced that his sister was born. Loplop often appeared in collages of other artists' work, such as Loplop presents André Breton. Ernst drew a great deal of controversy with his 1926 painting The Virgin Chastises the infant Jesus before Three Witnesses: André Breton, Paul Éluard, and the Painter. In 1927 he married Marie-Berthe Aurenche, and it is thought his relationship with her may have inspired the erotic subject matter of The Kiss and other works of this year. In 1930, he appeared in the film L'Âge d'Or
L'Âge d'Or
L'Âge d'or is a 1930 surrealist film directed by Spanish filmmaker Luis Buñuel and written by him and Salvador Dalí.The film began as a second collaboration with Dalí, but, by the time the film went into production, Buñuel and Dalí had had a falling-out, and so Dalí actually had nothing to do with...
, directed by self-identifying Surrealist Luis Buñuel
Luis Buñuel
Luis Buñuel Portolés was a Spanish-born filmmaker — later a naturalized citizen of Mexico — who worked in Spain, Mexico, France and the US..-Early years:...
. Ernst began to make sculpture in 1934, and spent time with Alberto Giacometti
Alberto Giacometti
Alberto Giacometti was a Swiss sculptor, painter, draughtsman, and printmaker.Alberto Giacometti was born in the canton Graubünden's southerly alpine valley Val Bregaglia and came from an artistic background; his father, Giovanni, was a well-known post-Impressionist painter...
. In 1938, the American heiress and artistic patron
Patrón
Patrón is a luxury brand of tequila produced in Mexico and sold in hand-blown, individually numbered bottles.Made entirely from Blue Agave "piñas" , Patrón comes in five varieties: Silver, Añejo, Reposado, Gran Patrón Platinum and Gran Patrón Burdeos. Patrón also sells a tequila-coffee blend known...
Peggy Guggenheim
Peggy Guggenheim
Marguerite "Peggy" Guggenheim was an American art collector. Born to a wealthy New York City family, she was the daughter of Benjamin Guggenheim, who went down with the Titanic in 1912 and the niece of Solomon R. Guggenheim, who would establish the Solomon R...
acquired a number of Max Ernst's works which she displayed in her new museum in London. Ernst and Peggy Guggenheim were also married to one another from 1942 to 1946.
World War II and later life
Camp des Milles
The Camp des Milles was a French internment camp, opened in September 1939, in a former tile factory near the village of Les Milles, part of the commune of Aix-en-Provence .-History:...
, near Aix-en-Provence
Aix-en-Provence
Aix , or Aix-en-Provence to distinguish it from other cities built over hot springs, is a city-commune in southern France, some north of Marseille. It is in the region of Provence-Alpes-Côte d'Azur, in the département of Bouches-du-Rhône, of which it is a subprefecture. The population of Aix is...
, along with fellow surrealist, Hans Bellmer
Hans Bellmer
Hans Bellmer was a German artist, best known for the life-sized pubescent female dolls he produced in the mid-1930s. Historians of art and photography also consider him a Surrealist photographer.-Biography:...
, who had recently emigrated to Paris on the outbreak of World War II. Thanks to the intercession of Paul Éluard
Paul Éluard
Paul Éluard, born Eugène Émile Paul Grindel , was a French poet who was one of the founders of the surrealist movement.-Biography:...
and other friends, including the journalist Varian Fry
Varian Fry
Varian Mackey Fry was an American journalist. Fry ran a rescue network in Vichy France that helped approximately 2,000 to 4,000 anti-Nazi and Jewish refugees to escape Nazi Germany and the Holocaust.-Early life:...
, he was discharged a few weeks later. Soon after the Nazi occupation of France, he was arrested again, this time by the Gestapo, but managed to escape and flee to America with the help of Guggenheim. He left behind his lover, Leonora Carrington
Leonora Carrington
Leonora Carrington OBE was a British-born Mexican artist, a surrealist painter and a novelist. She lived most of her life in Mexico City.-Early life:...
, and she suffered a major mental breakdown. Ernst and Guggenheim arrived in the United States in 1941 and were married the following year. Along with other artists and friends (Marcel Duchamp
Marcel Duchamp
Marcel Duchamp was a French artist whose work is most often associated with the Dadaist and Surrealist movements. Considered by some to be one of the most important artists of the 20th century, Duchamp's output influenced the development of post-World War I Western art...
and Marc Chagall
Marc Chagall
Marc Chagall Art critic Robert Hughes referred to Chagall as "the quintessential Jewish artist of the twentieth century."According to art historian Michael J...
) who had fled from the war and lived in New York City, Ernst helped inspire the development of Abstract expressionism
Abstract expressionism
Abstract expressionism was an American post–World War II art movement. It was the first specifically American movement to achieve worldwide influence and put New York City at the center of the western art world, a role formerly filled by Paris...
.
His marriage to Guggenheim did not last, and in Beverly Hills, California
Beverly Hills, California
Beverly Hills is an affluent city located in Los Angeles County, California, United States. With a population of 34,109 at the 2010 census, up from 33,784 as of the 2000 census, it is home to numerous Hollywood celebrities. Beverly Hills and the neighboring city of West Hollywood are together...
in October 1946, in a double ceremony with Man Ray
Man Ray
Man Ray , born Emmanuel Radnitzky, was an American artist who spent most of his career in Paris, France. Perhaps best described simply as a modernist, he was a significant contributor to both the Dada and Surrealist movements, although his ties to each were informal...
and Juliet P. Browner, he married Dorothea Tanning
Dorothea Tanning
Dorothea Tanning is an American painter, printmaker, sculptor and writer. She has also designed sets and costumes for ballet and theatre.-Biography:...
. The couple first made their home in Sedona, Arizona
Sedona, Arizona
Sedona is a city that straddles the county line between Coconino and Yavapai counties in the northern Verde Valley region of the U.S. state of Arizona...
. In 1948 Ernst wrote the treatise Beyond Painting. As a result of the publicity, he began to achieve financial success.
In 1953 he and Tanning moved to a small town in the south of France where he continued to work. The City, and the Galeries Nationales du Grand-Palais in Paris published a complete catalogue of his works.
In 1966 he created a chess set made of glass which he named "Immortel"; it has been described by the poet André Verdet as "a masterpiece of bewitching magic, worthy of a Maya palace or the residence of a Pharaon".
Ernst died on 1 April 1976 in Paris. He was interred at the Père Lachaise Cemetery.
Early works
- Aquis SubmersusAquis SubmersusAquis Submersus is a painting by the German dadaist/surrealist Max Ernst. It is one of Ernst’s earliest known surrealist works.It depicts a swimming pool surrounded by buildings. The sense of dimension is unclear. The features of the buildings appear to be hand-drawn. The buildings leave shadows...
(1919) - Trophy, HypertrophiedTrophy, HypertrophiedTrophy, Hypertrophied is a work of art by the German dadaist/surrealist Max Ernst. This is one of Ernst’s earliest known works. It was created through a photomechanical process called line-block printing, rarely used in printmaking, to which drawing was added. It depicts a complex mechanical...
(1919) - Little Machine Constructed by Minimax Dadamax in PersonLittle Machine Constructed by Minimax Dadamax in PersonLittle Machine Constructed by Minimax Dadamax in Person is a mixed-media work of art by the German dadaist/surrealist Max Ernst....
(1919–1920) - Murdering AirplaneMurdering AirplaneMurdering Airplane is a collage by the German dadaist/surrealist Max Ernst. It depicts a monstrous aircraft with human arms flying over an open field. In the lower right-hand corner two soldiers are carrying a third wounded soldier....
(1920) - The Hat Makes the ManThe Hat Makes the ManThe Hat Makes the Man is a collage by the German dadaist/surrealist Max Ernst. It is composed of cut out images of hats from catalogues linked by gouache and pencil outlines to create abstract anthropomorphic figures...
(1920) - CelebesThe Elephant CelebesThe Elephant Celebes is a 1921 painting by the German Dadaist and surrealist Max Ernst. It is among the most famous of Ernst's early surrealist works and "undoubtedly the first masterpiece of Surrealist painting in the De Chirico tradition." It combines the vivid, dreamlike atmosphere of...
(1921) - Oedipus Rex (1922)
First French period
- Pietà or Revolution by NightPietà or Revolution by NightPietà or Revolution by Night is a painting by German surrealist and Dadaist Max Ernst.The painting is interpreted as symbolic of the turbulent relationship between the artist and his father, an amateur painter and staunch Catholic...
(1923) - Saint Cecilia (1923)
- The Wavering Woman (1923)
- Ubu Imperator (1923)
- Two Children Are Threatened by a Nightingale (1924)
- Woman, Old Man and Flower (1924)
- Paris Dream (1924–25)
- The Blessed Virgin Chastises the Infant Jesus Before Three Witnesses: A.B., P.E. and the Artist (1926)
- Forest series, e.g. Forest and DoveForest and DoveForest and Dove is a painting by the German surrealist Max Ernst. It depicts a nocturnal scene of a forest of bizarre, abstract trees. In the thick of the forest is a child-like depiction of a dove....
(1927), The WoodThe Wood (Max Ernst)The Wood is a painting by the German surrealist Max Ernst.Ernst was haunted by the atmosphere of forests and by the birds which inhabit them. Here, the herring-bone effect of the trees and the grainy sky reveal his technique of grattage. Layers of paint were applied to the canvas, which was...
(1927) - LoplopLoplopLoplop is the name of a birdlike character featured in prints, collages and paintings by artist Max Ernst. Loplop was an alter ego which Ernst developed and functioned as a familiar animal....
series, e.g. Loplop Introduces Loplop (1930), Loplop Introduces a Young Girl (1930) - City series, e.g. Petrified City (1933), Entire City (1935–36, two versions)
- Garden Aeroplane Trap series (1935–36)
- The Joy of Living (1936)
- The Fascinating Cypress (1940)
- The Robing of the Bride (1940)
American period
- Totem and Taboo (1941)
- Marlene (1941)
- Napoleon in the WildernessNapoleon in the WildernessNapoleon in the Wilderness in a 1941 surrealist painting by Max Ernst in the collection of the Museum of Modern Art.-References:***...
(1941) - Day and Night (1941–42)
- The Antipope (1942)
- Europe After the Rain II (1940–42)
- Surrealism and Painting (1942)
- Vox Angelica (1943)
- Everyone Here Speaks Latin (1943)
- Painting for Young People (1943)
- The Eye of Silence (1944)
- Dream and Revolution (1945)
- The Phases of the Night (1946)
- Design In Nature (1947)
- Inspired Hill (1950)
- Colorado of Medusa, Color-Raft of Medusa (1953)
Second French period
- Mundus est fabula (1959)
- The Garden of France (1962)
- The Sky Marries the Earth (1964)
- The World of the Naive (1965)
- Ubu, Father and Son (1966)
- Birth of a Galaxy (1969)
- "La dernière forêt" (The last forest) (1960- 1970)
Collages, lithographs, drawings, illustrations, etc.
- Fiat modes (1919, portfolio of lithographs)
- Illustrations for books by Paul ÉluardPaul ÉluardPaul Éluard, born Eugène Émile Paul Grindel , was a French poet who was one of the founders of the surrealist movement.-Biography:...
: Répétitions (1921), Les malheurs des immortels (1922), Au défaut du silence (1925) - Histoire Naturelle (1926, frottage drawings)
- La femme 100 têtes (1929, graphic novel)
- Rêve d'une petite fille qui voulut entrer au carmel (1930, graphic novel)
- Une Semaine de BontéUne Semaine de BonteUne semaine de bonté is a graphic novel and artist's book by Max Ernst, first published in 1934. It comprises 182 images created by cutting up and re-organizing illustrations from Victorian encyclopedias and novels.-History:...
(1934, graphic novel) - Paramythes (1949, collages with poems)
- Illustrations for editions of works by Lewis CarrollLewis CarrollCharles Lutwidge Dodgson , better known by the pseudonym Lewis Carroll , was an English author, mathematician, logician, Anglican deacon and photographer. His most famous writings are Alice's Adventures in Wonderland and its sequel Through the Looking-Glass, as well as the poems "The Hunting of the...
: Symbolic Logic (1966, under the title Logique sans peine), The Hunting of the Snark (1968), and Lewis Carrols Wunderhorn (1970, an anthology of texts) - Aux petits agneaux (1971, lithographs)
- Paysage marin avec capucin (1972, illustrated book with essays by various authors)
- Oiseaux en peril (1975, etchings with aquatint in colors; published posthumously)
Sculpture
- Bird (c. 1924)
- Oedipus (1934, two versions)
- Moonmad (1944)
- An Anxious Friend (1944)
- Capricorn (1948)
- Two and Two Make One (1956)
- Immortel (1966–67)
Ernst in modern culture
- Many of Ernst's works from Une Semaine de BontéUne Semaine de BonteUne semaine de bonté is a graphic novel and artist's book by Max Ernst, first published in 1934. It comprises 182 images created by cutting up and re-organizing illustrations from Victorian encyclopedias and novels.-History:...
are used in albums by American rock group The Mars VoltaThe Mars VoltaThe Mars Volta is a Grammy award winning American progressive rock band from El Paso, Texas. Founded in 2001 by guitarist Omar Rodríguez-López and vocalist Cedric Bixler-Zavala, the band incorporates various influences including progressive rock, krautrock, jazz fusion, Latin American music, and...
. Also, Barefoot In The Head, a collaboration between guitarist Thurston MooreThurston MooreThurston Joseph Moore is an American musician best known as a singer, songwriter and guitarist of Sonic Youth. He has also participated in many solo and group collaborations outside of Sonic Youth, as well as running the Ecstatic Peace! record label...
and saxophonists Jim SauterJim Sauter (musician)Jim Sauter is a saxophonist and founding member of New York City based improvisational group Borbetomagus....
and Don DietrichDon Dietrich (musician)Don Dietrich is a saxophonist and founding member of New York City based improvisational group, Borbetomagus.Recently, he has become involved with the noise/free jazz "supergroup" The New Monuments .-References:...
of BorbetomagusBorbetomagusBorbetomagus are a free improvisation/noise music group. They are cited by critics as pioneers of aggressive improvised noise music.- Biography :...
, features a collage from this same book. - The American rock group Mission of BurmaMission of BurmaMission of Burma is an American post-punk band formed in Boston, Massachusetts in 1979. The band was formed by Roger Miller , Clint Conley , Peter Prescott and Martin Swope...
titled two songs after the artist: "Max Ernst" was the b-side of their first 1978 single (now included on the CD of Signals, Calls and MarchesSignals, Calls and MarchesSignals, Calls, and Marches is the first EP by Boston-based band Mission of Burma, released in 1981 . For the CD issue, Rykodisc remastered the six original songs and added the two tracks from the band's 1980 debut 7" single, "Academy Fight Song." The EP was remastered by Matador Records in 2008...
), mentioning two of Ernst's paintings (The Blessed Virgin Chastises the Infant Jesus and Garden Airplane-Trap) and ending with the words "Dada dada dada ..." repeated many times and distorted via tape loopTape loopIn music, tape loops are loops of prerecorded magnetic tape used to create repetitive, rhythmic musical patterns or dense layers of sound. Contemporary composers such as Steve Reich and Karlheinz Stockhausen used tape loops to create phase patterns and rhythms...
; their 2002 album OnOffOn features "Max Ernst's Dream". - The writer J. G. BallardJ. G. BallardJames Graham Ballard was an English novelist, short story writer, and prominent member of the New Wave movement in science fiction...
makes numerous references to the art works of Max Ernst in his breakthrough novel The Drowned WorldThe Drowned WorldThe Drowned World is a 1962 science fiction novel by J. G. Ballard. In contrast to much post-apocalyptic fiction, the novel features a central character who, rather than being disturbed by the end of the old world, is enraptured by the chaotic reality that has come to replace it...
(1962) and the experimental collection of short stories The Atrocity ExhibitionThe Atrocity ExhibitionThe Atrocity Exhibition is an experimental collection of "condensed novels" by British writer J. G. Ballard.Originally published in 1970 by Jonathan Cape. A revised large format paperback edition, with annotations by the author and illustrations by Phoebe Gloeckner, was issued by RE/Search in 1990...
(1970). - Europe After the Rain was used by musician John FoxxJohn FoxxJohn Foxx is an English singer, artist, photographer and teacher. He was the original lead singer of the band Ultravox before being replaced by Midge Ure, when he left to embark on a solo career in 1979...
as the title for the opening track of his 1981 album The GardenThe Garden (John Foxx album)The Garden is a 1981 album by John Foxx, the follow-up to his debut solo album Metamatic, released the previous year. However its instrumentation and highly romantic style is more comparable to Systems of Romance, his last album with former band Ultravox, released in 1978.-Production and style:The...
. - The first edition (Jonathan Cape) of J.G. Ballard's The Crystal WorldThe Crystal WorldThe Crystal World is a novel by English author J. G. Ballard, published in 1966.- Plot introduction :The novel tells the story of a physician trying to make his way deep into the jungle to a secluded leprosy treatment facility...
and the Penguin paperback edition of James BlishJames BlishJames Benjamin Blish was an American author of fantasy and science fiction. Blish also wrote literary criticism of science fiction using the pen-name William Atheling, Jr.-Biography:...
's A Case of ConscienceA Case of ConscienceA Case of Conscience is a science fiction novel by James Blish, first published in 1958. It is the story of a Jesuit who investigates an alien race that has no religion; they are completely without any concept of God, an afterlife, or the idea of sin; and the species evolves through several forms...
both use details from The Eye of Silence as cover art.
Legacy
Max Ernst's life and career are the subject of Peter SchamoniPeter Schamoni
Peter Schamoni was a German film director, producer and screenwriter. He directed 35 films between 1957 and 2011. His 1966 film No Shooting Time for Foxes was entered into the 16th Berlin International Film Festival, where it won the Silver Bear Extraordinary Jury Prize...
's 1991 documentary Max Ernst. Dedicated to the art historian Werner Spies
Werner Spies
Werner Spies is a German art historian, journalist and organizer of exhibitions. From 1997 to 2000, he was also a director of the Centre Georges Pompidou in Paris.-Life and work:...
, it was assembled from interviews with Ernst, stills of his paintings and sculptures, and the memoirs of his wife Dorothea Tanning and son Jimmy. The 101-minute German film was released on DVD with English subtitles by Image Entertainment.
In 2005, "Max Ernst: A Retrospective" opened at the Metropolitan Museum of Art
Metropolitan Museum of Art
The Metropolitan Museum of Art is a renowned art museum in New York City. Its permanent collection contains more than two million works, divided into nineteen curatorial departments. The main building, located on the eastern edge of Central Park along Manhattan's Museum Mile, is one of the...
and included works such as Celebes (1921), Ubu Imperator (1923), and Fireside Angel (1937), which is one of the few definitively political pieces and is sub-titled The Triumph of Surrealism depicting a raging bird-like creature that symbolizes the wave of fascism
Fascism
Fascism is a radical authoritarian nationalist political ideology. Fascists seek to rejuvenate their nation based on commitment to the national community as an organic entity, in which individuals are bound together in national identity by suprapersonal connections of ancestry, culture, and blood...
that took over Europe. The exhibition also includes Ernst's works that experiment with free association writing and the techniques of frottage
Frottage (art)
In art, frottage is a surrealist and "automatic" method of creative production developed by Max Ernst.In frottage the artist takes a pencil or other drawing tool and makes a rubbing over a textured surface. The drawing can be left as is or used as the basis for further refinement...
, created from a rubbing from a textured surface; grattage, involving scratching at the surface of a painting; and decalcomania
Decalcomania
Decalcomania, from the French décalcomanie, is a decorative technique by which engravings and prints may be transferred to pottery or other materials. It was invented in England about 1750 and imported into the United States at least as early as 1865...
, which involves altering a wet painting by pressing a second surface against it and taking it away.
Ernst's son Jimmy
Jimmy Ernst
Jimmy Ernst was an American painter born in Germany.-Early life:Jimmy Ernst was born in 1920 in Cologne, Germany, the son of surrealist painter Max Ernst and Luise Straus, a well-known art historian and journalist. His parents divorced in 1922 and Ernst staying with his mother in Cologne...
, a well known German/American abstract expressionist painter, who lived on the south shore of Long Island
Long Island
Long Island is an island located in the southeast part of the U.S. state of New York, just east of Manhattan. Stretching northeast into the Atlantic Ocean, Long Island contains four counties, two of which are boroughs of New York City , and two of which are mainly suburban...
, died in 1984. His memoirs, A Not-So-Still Life, were published shortly before his death. His grandson Eric and granddaughter Amy are both artists and writers.
Gallery
External links
- Max-Ernst Museum Brühl
- Max Ernst works and biography Olga's Gallery
- Max Ernst works and biography Galerie Ludorff
- Max Ernst gallery Ten Dreams
- "Max Ernst, will-o'-the-wisp" Max Ernst explained to younger generation, Gilbert-Rts
- Max Ernst facts Artfacts.Net
- Max Ernst MasterPiece: "Immortel" Maxernstmasterpiece.com
- Max Ernst Exposition Max Ernst Exposition on the web
- Max-Ernst Biography