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INVENTORY OF THE LETTRISM PAPERS, 1946-1965
980036
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Table of contents
Title: Lettrism papers
Date (inclusive): 1946-1965
Number: 980036
Creator/Collector:
Queneau, Raymond, 1903-1976
Physical Description:
28.0 items
Repository:
The Getty Research Institute
Special Collections
1200 Getty Center Drive, Suite 1100
Los Angeles, California, 90049-1688
(310) 440-7390
Abstract: A collection of letters and ephemera belonging to editor Raymond Queneau, one of the founders of "Ouilipo." The materials
concern the avant-garde movement Lettrism, and comprise correspondence, manuscripts, typescripts, and ephemera.
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Language: Collection material is in
French
Raymond Queneau (1903-1973) worked with the surrealists as a young man before becoming known as one of the founders of "Oulipo"
(Ouvroir de littérature potentielle, or the Workshop of Potential Literature). Two of his most famous works are
Les exercices de style and
Zazie dans le métro, which Louis Malle filmed in 1960. As an editor at Gallimard, Queneau was extremely influential in the publication and support
of avant-garde movements and their proponents. Queneau began publishing Isidore Isou in the late 1940s and was supportive
of him and his efforts to establish Lettrism.
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Lettrism papers, 1946-1965, The Getty Research Institute, Los Angeles, Accession no. 980036.
Collection was acquired in 1998.
Lynda Bunting processed the collection in October 1998
Scope and Content of Collection
Letters and ephemera sent to editor Raymond Queneau concerning the avant-garde movement Lettrism, founded by Isidore Isou.
A letter, a clipping and the tract "Defense d'Isidore Isou" illustrate Isou's problems with obscenity charges brought against
him in 1962. Three letters to Queneau and a copy of a 7 p. letter from Isou to Gaston Gallimard, dated 1962 and 1964, plead
for continued support for the movement. Other materials by Isou are a handwritten card (1946), a handwritten cover design
for a proposed book "Oeuvres complètes de Isidore Isou" (n.d.), a typescript titled "Domaine artistique integral" (n.d.),
and the tract "Vive la retrospective surrealiste!" (1964), which denounces André Breton.
The collection also includes three handwritten letters from Gabriel Pomerand concerning books Queneau sent him during his
imprisonment (1949) and his hospitalization (1954), three typed letters from Jacques Spacagna regarding the issue of Bizarre
that he and Maurice Lemaître are preparing, and two letters from Lemaître (1962, 1965). Ephemera consist of two announcements
"Première manifestation lettriste" (n.d.) and "Le lettrisme" (n.d.), an invitation to a Lemaître event with ink drawings and
stapled film strips (n.d.), the program "La poesie et la musique lettristes et aphonistes" (n.d.), and a 4 p. advertisement,
with text by Noël Arnaud, for three recordings (1964).
Arranged in one series, in rough chronological order.
Queneau, Raymond, 1903-1976
Lettrism
Drawings (visual works)
Ephemera
Arnaud, Noël
Gallimard, Gaston, 1881-1975
Isou, Isidore
Lemaître, Maurice, 1926-
Pomerand, Gabriel, 1926-1972
Spacagna, Jacques