659 - Hans Bellmer

Hans Bellmer Untitled (from the series:Les Jeux de la Poupée) c. 1938 Vintage ferrotyped gelatin silver print on Agfa-Brovira paper. 26.3 x 23.6 cm. Mounted on cardboard, annotated in an unknown hand in pencil above the image on the mount. Provenance From Lotte Pritzel, Berlin, to the family of the current owner, Bavaria Literature Hans Bellmer, Hans Bellmer, Ostfildern 2006, ill. p. 99 Supplements: Hans Bellmer, Tour menthe poivrée à la louange des petites filles goulues, 1934, gelatin silver print (reproduction of a pencil drawing), 15.5 x 11.5 cm Hans Bellmer, title unknown, gelatin silver print (reproduction of a pencil drawing), 14.9 x 11.8 cm (14.9 x 12.5 cm) In 1933, Hans Bellmer started working on his initially rigid, later movable doll models, which he staged both as seductresses and objects of desire, exposing them in his photographs to sexual (and violent) fantasies. The so-called 'second doll' illustrated here, with its variable ball joints and extra limbs – the development of which involved the Berlin doll artist and friend Lotte Pritzel as an idea contributor – was completed by Bellmer in 1935. Largely isolated due to the political situation in Germany in 1936/37, he worked reclusively on the erotic setups of this doll, the publication of which caused a stir in Parisian Surrealist circles. After his wife's death in 1938, he moved to Paris. The publication planned for 1939 – Bellmer's second book on the subject – with texts by Paul Eluard, was only released in Paris in 1949 due to the war, under the title ‘Lex Jeux de la Poupée.’ It was a handmade limited edition (with pasted-in, coloured original photographs), produced in a run of 136 copies.