132 - Henri MICHAUX. Paintings. Seven poems and sixteen illustrations. Foreword by Louis Cheronnet.

Henri MICHAUX. Paintings. Seven poems and sixteen illustrations. Foreword by Louis Cheronnet. Paris, GLM, 1939. In-12, black half-calf bound with “small squares” embossing, covers in six hinged panels of sandblasted ebony stained in various tones, edged with black ebony gussets, sewn on two raised bands, pink nubuck linings and brown nubuck endpapers, cover and spine preserved, box in black half-box (Jean de Gonet, 2003). First edition. Important catalog featuring sixteen full-page phototype reproductions of Michaux’s paintings. (Coron, Les Éditions GLM, bibliography, no. 215.) A crucial publication for the recognition of Henri Michaux’s pictorial work, which was contested at the time by some of his close associates (including Jean Paulhan). The work was “after *Entre centre et absence*, but even more distinctly, the second mixed collection: ‘seven poems and sixteen illustrations.’ ” […] It was not an illustrated book. Quite the contrary: this time, it was the poems that accompanied the reproductions; the poems that commented on the paintings” (Jean-Pierre Martin, pp. 315–316). One of the 30 first-edition copies on Normandy vellum (no. 21), enhanced with an original drawing signed by the author—in this case, a gouache. This copy belonged to the publisher Louis Broder, according to the accompanying certificate from bookseller Jean-Claude Vrain, who privately acquired a large portion of the publisher’s library. Superb binding with ebony panels hinged by Jean de Gonet. ( Bibliothèque nationale de France, Henri Michaux, peindre, composer, écrire, Paris, 1999, no. 56: “This book is the first in which Michaux combines reproductions of his paintings with poems. The war and its monsters are omnipresent.”)