L’Opium
*L’Opium* is a slight yet electric publication in which an early visionary prose text by Alfred Jarry is reawakened through four original engravings by Dado. Fata Morgana was an especially apt publisher for such a project, having long championed works in which image, poetry, and altered states of mind converge. Jarry’s text is not among his most famous books, yet it reaches directly into the imaginative territory that would later prove crucial to the modern avant-garde. Dado answers that feverish intensity not with mere illustration but with an autonomous visual language of his own, organic and unsettling. The result is more than a reprint: it becomes a genuine reinterpretation. The small edition on vélin d’Arches gives the work the aura of a refined artist’s book. For the bibliophile, it offers a discreet yet highly meaningful encounter between a proto-avant-garde writer and one of the late twentieth century’s most visionary artists.
Quantity
Jarry, Alfred
Dado
L’Opium
1984 | Montpellier | Fata Morgana
A small yet intensely charged artist’s book, in which Jarry’s visionary early text meets Dado’s engraving with singular force.
*L’Opium* is a slight yet electric publication in which an early visionary prose text by Alfred Jarry is reawakened through four original engravings by Dado. Fata Morgana was an especially apt publisher for such a project, having long championed works in which image, poetry, and altered states of mind converge. Jarry’s text is not among his most famous books, yet it reaches directly into the imaginative territory that would later prove crucial to the modern avant-garde. Dado answers that feverish intensity not with mere illustration but with an autonomous visual language of his own, organic and unsettling. The result is more than a reprint: it becomes a genuine reinterpretation. The small edition on vélin d’Arches gives the work the aura of a refined artist’s book. For the bibliophile, it offers a discreet yet highly meaningful encounter between a proto-avant-garde writer and one of the late twentieth century’s most visionary artists.
€680
Condition Report:
In-Depth Study
References & Bibliography
Format
In-8 (Octavo) approx. 20 × 26 cm
Edition Particulars
One of the 72 copies on vélin d’Arches.
Print Run
72
Copy Number
No. 35
Paper
vélin d’Arches
Inscription
No inscription
Product DETAIL
In this short hallucinatory text, Alfred Jarry leads the reader through an opium dream that almost immediately breaks away from ordinary reality. The narrator begins in a feverish state and feels his astral body separating from his earthly one. He then enters an immense mortuary space where corpses, water, ice, and movement merge into a strange rhythm. He climbs glistening stairways, encounters an attendant among the dead, and is directed onward into further chambers where poets, murderers, and bureaucratic counters coexist. He next crosses a fantastic realm of cages, animals, books, and religious or musical visions. By the end he returns to his chair and to his body, as if the entire journey had formed a circular dream. The piece is not narrative in the conventional sense, but unfolds as a sequence of metamorphoses and linked images. Its atmosphere is one of Symbolist fever, black humour, and visionary dislocation.
Waldberg, Patrick · Ernst, Max
Aux Petits Agneaux
A artist’s book resulting from the collaboration between writer Patrick Waldberg and surrealist master Max Ernst. This first edition includes 19 original lithographs printed on luxurious vélin d'Arches. Published in Paris in 1971 in a limited edition of 174 copies signed by both author and artist, and presented in a custom publisher’s box.
Illustrated Book
€2,200
Bédouin, Jean-Louis · Hallart, Guy
L'arbre descend du singe
L'Arbre descend du singe is a beautifully illustrated edition that highlights the collaboration between the poet Jean-Louis Bedouin and the artist Guy Hallart. The work, published in a limited edition, is characterized by a rich dialogue between poetry and image, where the visual compositions reflect the dreamy and often cryptic nature of Bedouin's texts. The book is a tangible testament to the artistic symbiosis between the two creators and offers a unique insight into a creative dialogue from the mid-1970s.
Illustrated Book
€700
Michaux, Henri · Bettencourt, Pierre
Arriver à se réveiller
A rare first edition of Arriver à se réveiller, written by Henri Michaux in the tremulous post-war years. The text unfolds as an inward journey toward lucidity, where sleep and waking mirror each other. Printed and published by Pierre Bettencourt in his own workshop, the edition’s small run preserves the work’s intimacy. The title-page vignette, a linocut by Bettencourt, sets a spare, rhythmic visual key that amplifies Michaux’s vigilant, vulnerable tone. This copy is handsomely bound in brown morocco with balsa boards by Miguet, a tactile nod to lightness under tension. For bibliophiles, it is an exemplary union of poetry, craft, and experiment. The volume embodies the independence of the post-war small press and Michaux’s radical sensitivity.
Illustrated Book
€680
Char, Rene · Stael, Nicolas de
Arrière-histoire du poème pulvérisé
*Arrière-histoire du poème pulvérisé* is a later illustrated edition of a key text in which René Char looks back on the genesis and inner background of *Le Poème pulvérisé*. Published in 1972 by Imprimerie Union, it opens with a colour frontispiece by Nicolas de Staël. The pairing of Char and de Staël is especially charged: two post-war voices, each seeking concentration, clarity, and rupture in his own medium. This copy is one of only six hors commerce copies on Arches and is signed. The autograph presentation inscription to Doctor Marcel Zara, with poetic quotation and October 1972 dating, makes it a deeply personal copy.
Illustrated Book
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The Architecture of Absurdity: Alfred Jarry, Pataphysics and the Destructive Aesthetics of the Ubu Cycle
From schoolyard prank to cultural revolution: how Alfred Jarry created Père Ubu and the science of pataphysics, permanently transforming modern theater, literature, and philosophy.