Une Semaine de Bonté

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Artist/Maker	Max Ernst (artist) Bucher, Jeanne (publisher)
Place of origin	France (made)

Heliogravure from a series entitled 'Une Semaine de Bonté'. The series is divided into seven parts, one for each day of the week, with each section illustrating one of Ernst's 'seven capital elements'. Each print is recto-verso. Third volume: Mardi (Teusday). Element: Le Feu (fire).

Object details

Categories	Prints Collages
Object type	Print
Title	Une Semaine de Bonté (series title)
Materials and techniques	Recto-verso heliogravure Paper Gravure Printing
Brief description	Heliogravure by Max Ernst from a series of plates entitled 'Une Semaine de Bonté, ou Les Sept Elements Capitaux', ('A Week of Kindness, or the Seven Capital Elements'), France, 1934
Physical description	Heliogravure from a series entitled 'Une Semaine de Bonté'. The series is divided into seven parts, one for each day of the week, with each section illustrating one of Ernst's 'seven capital elements'. Each print is recto-verso. Third volume: Mardi (Teusday). Element: Le Feu (fire).
Dimensions	Height: 10.58in Width: 8.125in Measurements taken from Circ. card index
Copy number	482/800
Object history	Published originally as a collage novel in 5 volumes using cut up and reassembled Victorian engravings, reproduced photomechanically. It first appeared in 1934 in a series of five pamphlets of fewer than 1000 copies each. There are 182 plates in the entire series are subdivided under the following headings: 1. cahier. Le lion de Belfort -- 2. cahier. L'eau -- 3. cahier. La cour du dragon -- 4. cahier. Œdipe -- Dernier cahier. Le rire du coq. L'Ile de Pâques. L'intérieur de la vie. La clé des chants. The National Art LIbrary holds an original 1934 volume.
Subjects depicted	Horror Sin Nightmare Dream Surrealism
Bibliographic references	Max Ernst's Une Semaine de Bonté, ou Les Sept Elements Capitaux is a graphic novel formed by meticulously collaging Victorian prints, particularly wood engravings, discovered in encyclopedia, illustrated novels and 19th century sales catalogues. The collage was carried out with such precision that upon reprinting, the joins are rendered invisible. After La Femme 100 têtes (1929), and Rêve d'une petite fille qui voulut entrer au Carmel (1930), Une semaine de bonté was Max Ernst's third collage novel. Originally intended to be published in seven volumes associating each book with a day of the week, they were compiled into just five limited edition print runs. Melding torture, sexuality, fairy tales, mythology, violence and brutality, the complex and poetic prints are partly a response to the horrors of war and the rise of National Socialism in Ernst's native Germany at the time. The 'novel' has no words so is open to interpretation, however in the last book the days are accompanied by selected quotations from Marcel Schwob, Jean Hans Arp, André Breton, Paul Eluard and others. The seven symbolic elements – 'La boue' (Mud), 'L'eau' (Water), 'Le feu' (Fire), 'Le sang' (Blood), 'Le noir' (Darkness), 'La vue' (Sight) and 'L'inconnu' (The Unknown) – provide another means of structuring the book, and the surreal motifs delve into the hidden desires and surpressed fears of the bourgeoisie. Human heads are frequently replaced with lion's heads and bird's heads and various recurring emblems represent different power struggles. In total, 184 works were created, with 182 in the published work. They were exhibited just once in their entirety during Ernst's lifetime, in 1936 in Madrid at the Museo Nacional de Arte Moderno. In 2008 and 2009, specific interest in them revived as four large institutions exhibited the series, at the Max Ernst Museum, the Kunsthalle in Hamburg, MAPFRE in Madrid, and the Musée d'Orsay in Paris. Taken from Departmental Circulation Register 1967
Collection	Prints, Drawings & Paintings Collection
Accession number	CIRC.181-1967

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Record created	July 1, 2009
Record URL	https://collections.vam.ac.uk/item/O1106068/une-semaine-de-bonté-print-max-ernst/

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