BALZAC (Honoré).

The Unknown Masterpiece. Paris, Ambroise Vollard, 1931. In-4, dark green morocco, large rectangular composition of abstract form, different on each board, traced by cold curved fillets intersecting and mosaicked with pieces of wine and putty morocco, each of them framed by a gilt fillet and an embossed border of small squares, same border repeated at the foot of the boards and passing over the spine, smooth spine with gilt title, lining and endpapers of wine-leather suede, gilt edges, untrimmed, cover and spine, half-maroquin folder and slipcase (Georges Cretté). Cramer, n°20. 13 original etchings, including one representing the subjects of the 12 etchings, and 67 drawings by Pablo Picasso, woodcut by Georges Aubert. One of the most controversial books of Vollard and Picasso. Some considered it, as François Chapon wrote, one of the works that does the most honor to Vollard, crowning the creations of his maturity; others, probably disconcerted by the alternation of woodcuts and copper engravings, were of the opposite opinion, following Abraham Horodisch (Picasso as a book artist) Today the Masterpiece has taken its place among the illustrated books of this period, although Picasso always refused to call his contribution to publishing a true illustration, i.e. rejecting the traditional meaning of images inspired by a text to an artist. The explanation is now known: Vollard had bought from Picasso a series of engravings on the theme of "the artist and his model"; he immediately saw the opportunity to adapt it to a book that he sought for a long time, when Blaise Cendrars proposed the book of Balzac, which he immediately adopted. (See Antoine Coron, From Goya to Max Ernst, Illustrated Books from the R.M. Library, 2018, pp. 255-263). Edition of 340 numbered copies, this one of 240 on Rives paper. Beautiful binding by Georges Cretté, unknown to Marcel Garrigou who cites in his work on the bookbinder (Georges Cretté, 1984) only one binding executed on this title, quite close to ours (n°13, reproduction pl. III).