Ernst O. E. Fischer collection of Max Ernst prints, 1912-1974

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Summary

Creators:
Fischer, Ernst O. E.
Abstract:
A collection of prints by leading Dada and Surrealist artist, Max Ernst, assembled by Ernst O.E. Fischer and comprising 164 sheets. Approximately 66 additional pieces in bound books are now part of the Library's core collection. It constitutes a comprehensive selection of the artist's graphic oeuvre and includes a number of unique examples.
Extent:
164 Sheets (4 boxes, 30 flat file folders)
Language:
Collection material is in English

Background

Scope and content:

Max Ernst has been recognized as one of the most significant of the artists associated with the Dada and Surrealist movements of the first half of the 20th century. In his graphic work, Ernst continued the innovative approach that characterized his drawing and painting; his invention of frottage (literally "rubbing," from frotter, "to rub") in 1925 appeared in his printmaking as well. While Expressionist artists were reviving the woodcut for its aesthetic properties, the overwhelming majority of Ernst's prints were achieved by intaglio and planographic processes, often incorporating photographic methods.

Separate sheets, frontispieces to books, and illustrations for books written by Ernst and others bring Ernst's total print production to over 500 works. The present collection, assembled by Ernst O. E. Fischer, is comprised of 164 separate sheets. The collection is therefore far from complete, but constitutes a comprehensive selection of the artist's graphic oeuvre and includes a number of unique examples. Approximately 66 additional examples exist in bound books acquired with the collection and transferred to the Library.

Arrangement note

Arranged chronologically in consecutively numbered folders.

Biographical / historical:

Max Ernst, a leading Dada and Surrealist artist, was born in Brühl, Germany on April 2, 1891. He co-founded the Cologne branch of the Dada movement in 1919 with Johannes Baargeld ("Johnny Money" née Alfred Grünewald) and mounted the first Dada exhibition in Cologne that same year. His interest in technical and technological experimentation in all mediums is perhaps most evident in his graphic work. Ernst had little formal instruction in the arts, other than from his father, a self-taught amateur artist. Ernst chose instead to study philosophy and art history at the University of Bonn, beginning in 1910 until his enlistment in the army in August, 1914. In his graphic work, following a small series of linoleum cuts from 1912 and a recently discovered (1985) woodcut from 1917, he entirely abandoned traditional relief printing, the preferred medium of the Expressionists, in favor of intaglio and planographic methods. These methods enabled him to employ collage elements through the use of transfer and photographic technologies in combination with the more traditional techniques.

Ernst's collages differed in several respects from those of the Cubists, whose aims were tied to a formalist aesthetic, as well as from the more politically charged work of Berlin Dada artists such as John Heartfield and Richard Huelsenbeck. Ernst sought to conceal the collage origins of his images by reproducing them photomechanically. He used black-and-white wood engravings reproduced in magazine and catalog illustrations, carefully trimming each image to produce a tightly integrated overall effect. This method emphasized the primary importance of the contradictory qualities of the juxtaposed images over formal considerations, in keeping with the basic tenets of Surrealism spelled out by its foremost apologist, Andre Breton.

In 1941 Ernst arrived in the United States. In 1946 he married Dorothea Tanning in a double marriage ceremony with Juliet and Man Ray in Beverly Hills. He became a citizen of the U.S. in 1948. He returned permanently to live in Europe in 1953 and became a citizen of France in 1958. The overwhelming majority of Ernst's prints date to the last twenty-five years of his life, when he associated with a small number of master printers, primarily in Paris. He died there on April 1, 1976.

Acquisition information:
Acquired in 1990.
Physical location:
To access physical materials on site, go to the library catalog record for this collection and click "Request an Item." Click here for access policy.
Rules or conventions:
archives, personal papers, and manuscripts

Access and use

Location of this collection:
1200 Getty Center Drive, Suite 1100
Los Angeles, CA 90049-1688, US
Contact:
(310) 440-7390
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