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Max Ernst : a Retrospective

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Max Ernst : a Retrospective w % max ernst Digitized by the Internet Archive in 2012 with funding from Metropolitan New York Library Council - METRO s http://archive.org/details/maxerOOerns max ernst ^ ,s* <*€:. i.**' .»**' Sf --- --- * /^ V " max ernst: a retrospective This project is supported by a grant from the National Endowment for the Arts in Washington, D.C., a federal Agency The Solomon R. Guggenheim Museum, New York Published by The Solomon R. Guggenheim Foundation New York, 1975 Library of Congress Card Catalogue No: 74-29415 ®The Solomon R. Guggenheim Foundation, 1975 Printed in the United States Artists in Exile, New York, 1942, front row I. to r.: Matta, Zadkine, Tangtty, Ernst, Chagall, Leger; second row: Breton, Mondrian, Masson, Ozenfant, Lipcbitz, Tchelitchew, Walter Dobbeltnann, Max Ernst, Briihl, c. 1908 Seligtnann, Berman photo George Piatt Lynes p ml $ t- 1 flag wSv f 4 • The Solomon R. Guggenheim Foundation PRESIDENT Peter O. Lawson-Johnston TRUSTEES H. H. Arnason, Eleanor Countess Castle Stewart, Joseph W. Donner, Mason Welch Gross, Eugene W. Leake, Frank R. Milliken, Henry Allen Moe, A. Chauncey Newlin, Mrs. Henry Obre, Daniel Catton Rich, Albert E. Thiele, Michael F. Wettach. The Solomon R. Guggenheim Museum DIRECTOR Thomas M. Messer STAFF Henry Berg, Deputy Director Linda Konheim, Program Administrator; Agnes R. Connolly, Auditor; Susan L. Halper, Administrative Assistant; Eric Siegeltuch, Assistant for Management; Vanessa Jalet, Secretary to the Director; Darrie Hammer, Information. Louise Averill Svendsen, Curator; Diane Waldman, Curator of Exhibitions; Margit Rowell, Curator of Special Exhibitions; Angelica Zander Rudenstine, Research Curator; Linda Shearer, Assistant Curator; Carol Fuerstein, Editor; Mary Joan Hall, Librarian; Ward Jackson, Archivist; Sabine Rewald, Coordinator. Anne B. Grausam, Public Affairs Officer; Miriam Emden, Members' Representative; Carolyn Porcelli, Coordinator. Orrin Riley, Conservator; Lucy Belloli, Assistant Conservator; David Roger Anthony, Registrar; Elizabeth M. Funghini, Cherie A. Summers, AssistantJlegistrars; Robert E. Mates, Photographer; Dana Cranmer, Technical Manager. Peter G. Loggin, Building Superintendent; Guy Fletcher, Jr., Assistant Building Superintendent; Charles F. Banach, Head Guard. Aaron Karp, Operations Supervisor; Saul Fuerstein, Preparator; Lome Swarthout, Carpenter; Hiram Lewis, Installation Specialist. lenders to the exhibition Siegfried Adler, Montagnola, Switzerland M. Arp-Hagenbach, Locarno Roger L. Baum, Milan Timothy Baum, New York Mr. and Mrs. Edwin Bergman Rosamond Bernier Collection, New York Hans Bolliger, Zurich The Bonomi Collection Marechal Brown, Villanova, Pennsylvania Simone Collinet, Paris The Arnold H. Crane Collection, Chicago Mr. and Mrs. Harold Diamond Ernst Fischer, Krefeld New York, 1942 Mr. and Mrs. Maurice Fulton, Glencoe, Illinois © Copyright Arnold Newman, New York Dr. Guy Genon-Catalot, Paris Wilhelm Hack, Cologne Mme. Jean Krebs, Brussels Collection Lefebvre-Foinet The Arthur and Madeleine Lejwa Collection Mr. and Mrs. Julien Levy, Bridgewater, Connecticut The Jeffrey H. Loria Collection, New York Marcel Mabille, Brussels Morton D. May Menil Family Collection, Houston Collection Petit Mr. and Mrs. Bernard J. Reis Mr. and Mrs. Arnold A. Saltzman, Great Neck, New York Peter Schamoni Werner Schindler, Zurich Mr. and Mrs. Joseph R. Shapiro, Oak Park, Illinois Mr. and Mrs. Joseph Slifka Collection Sprengel, Hanover Harry Torczyner, La Peine Perdue, New York Mr. and Mrs. Burton Tremaine, Meriden, Connecticut J. Tronche, Paris The Lydia K. and Harry Lewis Winston Collection (Dr. and Mrs. Barnett Malbin, New York) Richard S. Zeisler, New York City of Manchester Art Galleries, England Galleria Civica d'Arte Moderna, Turin The Solomon R. Guggenheim Museum, New York Haags Gemeentemuseum, The Hague Kestner-Museum, Hanover Kunsthaus Zurich Kunstmuseum Basel Kunstmuseum Bonn Kunstmuseum Dusseldorf Kunstsammlung Nordrhein-Westfalen, Dusseldorf Museum Boymans-van Beuningen, Rotterdam The Museum of Modern Art, New York Museum des XX. Jahrhunderts, Vienna The Philadelphia Museum of Art Staatliche Museen Preussischer Kulturbesitz Nationalgalerie, Berlin Stadt Briihl, Germany Stedelijk Museum, Amsterdam Tel Aviv Museum Wadsworth Atheneum, Hartford Wallraf-Richartz-Museum, Cologne Washington University Gallery of Art, St. Louis Yale University Art Gallery, New Haven Paule Anglim Associates, San Francisco Galerie Beyeler Basel Galerie Dieter Brusberg, Hanover Galleria Galatea, Turin Galerie Jan Krugier, Geneva Minami Gallery, Tokyo Galleria Schwarz Collection, Milan Galerie der Spiegel, Cologne Tarica, Paris acknowledgments A retrospective exhibition in homage to Max Ernst, the great surviving figure of Dada and Surrealism, was long overdue in New York and in Paris. While considering such possibilities, the Guggenheim Museum was ap- proached in 1972 by Jean and Dominique de Menil, who offered their un- equalled Max Ernst collection for an American museum circuit including The Rice Museum, Houston, the William Rockhill Nelson Gallery and Mary Atkins Museum of Fine Arts, Kansas City, The Art Institute of Chicago and the Fogg Art Museum, Cambridge. We seized the opportunity eagerly but proposed to enlarge upon the de Menil contingent with additional loans. The result of this transformation was the most comprehensive Max Ernst retrospective ever attempted. It consists of approximately 300 paintings, col- lages, frottages, sculptures and illustrated books, one fourth of these from the Menil Family Collection. The total selection occupies four ramps and adjoin- ing spaces within Frank Lloyd Wright's spiral structure. This exhibition plan was submitted to Pontus Hulten, the recently appointed Director of the De- partment des Arts Plastiques of the Centre Beaubourg in Paris, and promptly translated into a commitment to render analogous homage to Max Ernst by presenting the Guggenheim show at the Grand Palais in the spring and summer of 1975. A retrospective of such scope and importance engages extraordinary efforts and exertions within and outside the museum with which these acknowledge- ments can deal only in the most summary manner. Loans, funds and cap- abilities, each in full measure, are needed and their generous provision should, therefore, be part of this record. The lenders must be mentioned at the outset since the mounting of the exhibition is due, above all, to their generous cooperation. The Guggenheim is aware of the sacrifices it imposes when owners of important works of art, whether private or institutional, are approached for loans and, therefore, wishes to acknowledge with emphatic gratitude an indebtedness assumed on behalf of a large public. Crucial also for the successful realization of the project was the generous help received from the National Endowment for the Arts. The sizeable financial aid extended in recent years by that agency of the federal gov- ernment to art museums has made it possible to continue with programs that would otherwise already be casualties of inflation and recession. The Max Ernst retrospective is an outstanding example of the Endowment's beneficial functioning. The realization of the show and of the accompanying catalogue depended upon museum workers charged with many divergent tasks. In addition to curators, registrars and conservators, public affairs personnel, editors and photographers took part in this major exhibition effort and deserve at least generic credit wherever their identities must remain submerged. The central responsibility for the staging of the Max Ernst retrospective rests with Diane 10 Waldman, the Guggenheim's Curator of Exhibitions, and it is therefore in her, as well as in my own, name that additional thanks are herewith ex- pressed to the following individuals who have been particularly helpful: Lothar Fischer, Berlin, Giinter Metken, Paris, Eva Stiinke, Galerie der Spiegel, Cologne, for research; Timothy Baum, Charles Byron, New York, Jimmy Ernst, Easthampton, Jill Levine, Cambridge, Massachusetts, James Mayor, The Mayor Gallery, London, Benedicte Pesle, Galerie Alexander Iolas, Werner Spies, Paris, for help in locating works; Harris Rosenstein, Menil Family Collection, Houston, for aid in organizing and coordinating technical aspects of the exhibition; members of the Guggenheim staff: Sabine Rewald, for assistance in all facets of the preparation of the catalogue and exhibition, Carol Fuerstein, for extensive editorial work on the catalogue, Elizabeth Funghini, registrar for the exhibition, Margit Rowell, for generous help in translating, and Mimi Poser for help in selecting works in Europe, Nancy Aronson for general assistance. A final word of deep appreciation must be reserved for Max Ernst himself. His gentle presence and his deep concern could not but help and inspire all those involved in the preparation of his show. Thomas M. Messer, Director The Solomon R. Guggenheim Museum Tzara's house, Paris, c. 1930, front row I. to r.: Tzara, Breton, Dali, Ernst, Man Ray; second row: Eluard, Arp, Tanguy, Crevel photo Man Ray Father, Philipp Ernst, c. 1886 Mother, Luise Ernst, c. 1890 Ernst's birthplace, Bruhl World War I New York, 1942 © Copyright Arnold Newman, New York 11 *ff • y I I <* . » » J nm< . ""fw»»' My wanderings, my unrest, my impatience, my doubts, my beliefs, my hal- lucinations, my loves, my outbursts of anger, my revolts, my contradictions, my refusals to submit to any discipline . have not created a climate favor- able to the creation of a peaceful, serene work. My work is like my
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