MAN RAY (1890-1976)

Together with his close friend, the French surrealist poet Paul Éluard, Man Ray published Les mains libres in 1937, a book of drawings and poems in which the present work was reproduced. Abstract and associative but cohesive, Man Ray and Éluard explore desire and artistic freedom through repeated disembodied hands and the female form. Daringly, the artist and poet inverted the typical relationship of text and illustration—Man Ray’s drawings were executed first, and Éluard’s poems “illustrated” the images thereafter. Inspired by the present work, Éluard writes:

Brosse à cheveux
by Paul Éluard

L’affiche disait méfiez-vous
Des teintures idéales

Et l’on allait répétant
Prenez exemple sur moi

Avec des rires entre les dents

Hairbrush
by Paul Éluard

The poster said beware
Of perfect dyes

And all went on repeating
Follow my example

With laughter through their teeth

P. Éluard and Man Ray, Les mains libres, Paris, 1937, p. 153.