Customer Reviews (13)

A Week of Kindness
This is a graphic novel and artist's book by Max Ernst. It comprises images created by cutting up and re-organizing illustrations from Victorian encyclopedias and novels and it is a surrealistic masterpiece, full of strange images of naked women, creatures with bird heads, dragon wings in rooms that may have mirrors that reflect something else or simply flooded with water. It is divided in chapters that correspond to the days of the week and to the "seven capital elements".
This book is the collection of full page reproductions of the work.

Une Semaine De Bonte: A Surrealistic Novel in Collage
This book is an imaginative world brought to us by the genius of Max Ernst. No matter if you like surreal art or not you will love the delightful darkness of this collage

To the Max
Truly amazing work by the Surrealist master. This is a great asset in the illustration library that never gets old to review.

Inexhaustible wonder
"Surrealism" is an overused word these days, drained of much of its original power ... but just open these startling pages of collage & you'll rediscover that it's still just as potent. Both disturbing dream & benign nightmare, the non-narrative accumulates in woozy intensity as you immerse yourself in it, swept away willingly by its ghostly flood of images. Like a genuine dream, there are constant, tantalizing hints of unfulfilled meaning -- it almost makes sense, but never quite does -- but that's not frustrating in the least. Instead, depending on your moods, you'll find multiple meanings ... or you can simply enjoy the experience itself, without trying to find some rational skeleton behind it all. And if it leads you to more of Max Ernst's work, all the better! Highly recommended!

the book doesn't really mean anything
the novel isn't meant to be consumed, it's a response to the graphic medium where works are meant to be a facile read. which means you're going to be stuck on a single page wondering what it means and how to make sense of it, but ernst didn't intend that, so diegesis isn't really possible ... Read more

Product Description
Surrealist artist Max Ernst defined collage as the "alchemy of the visual image." Students of his work have often dismissed this comment as simply a metaphor for the transformative power of using found images in a new context. Taking a wholly different perspective on Ernst and alchemy, however, M. E. Warlick persuasively demonstrates that the artist had a profound and abiding interest in alchemical philosophy and often used alchemical symbolism in works created throughout his career. A revival of interest in alchemy swept the artistic, psychoanalytic, historical, and scientific circles of the late nineteenth and early twentieth centuries, and Warlick sets Ernst's work squarely within this movement. Looking at both his art (many of the works she discusses are reproduced in the book) and his writings, she reveals how thoroughly alchemical philosophy and symbolism pervade his early Dadaist experiments, his foundational work in surrealism, and his many collages and paintings of women and landscapes, whose images exemplify the alchemical fusing of opposites. This pioneering research adds an essential key to understanding the multilayered complexity of Ernst's works, as it affirms his standing as one of Germany's most significant artists of the twentieth century. ... Read more

Customer Reviews (2)

Max Ernst and Alchemy
Warlick's inspired and wide-ranging exploration of Max Enrnst's lifelong involvement in alchemy greatly expands our knowledge and appreciation not only of a major surrealist painter, but also of the entire surrealist adventure, and of the art of alchemy as well.

The Interior Of Sight
Maybe it's because Max Ernst is alchemy personified that this analysis of his work and it's connection to alchemy is more or less a complete biography the man as a whole. It takes you through his psychological developement as a child to the developement of his sexual identity and ties it all in with his drive as an artist and as an alchemist. Unlike other books on his life or work, this one fuses all the elements together: psychology, alchemy, art, the occult and sex. It's uncanny how much ground "Max Ernst and Alchemy: A Magician in Search of Myth" covers. If you love Ernst this is the only book you'll ever need. It's superbly fleshed out. I was left both wanting more and comepletely satisfied! I guess since this is the only book of it's kind it takes the cake. Rarely does a study of this calibre see the light of day! It is truly the alchemy of the modern day alchemist. ... Read more

Customer Reviews (1)

Great
My father enjoyed this for his birthday present. He's liked Max Ernst for a long time. ... Read more

Product Description

Customer Reviews (6)

Discovering Max Ernst
Max Ernst was always one of those painters who resided on the periphery of my consciousness, who I never bothered to fully investigate. Probably because I put him, mistakenly, in the same category as Magritte, a painter who I know was important in the annals of art history but didn't reach me on a visceral level. As I am interested in art and artists in general I hadthe "Max Ernst" DVD on my Netflix list and one Sunday afternoon, having nothing better to do, I decided to watch it. I immediately fell in love with his paintings and was fascinated by his life. I searched Amazon and this book seemed to contain the best representation of his work. I was a little disconcerted with some of the reviews regarding the quality of the images. But as another reviewer stated, images in a book will never match the original art. As I have not, unfortunately, seen too many any of his paintings up close and personal this is not a problem for me. I find the quality to be quite adequate. Since acquiring the book it has become bedtime reading for me and I am thoroughly enjoying it. The first half of the book is an overview of his life and work, the second half is the catalog of the exhibit.

Image quality is perfectly acceptable
The reproductions in this book are every bit as good as those in a similarly-priced volume from Thames & Hudson (isbn 978-0500976586) in terms of color fidelity, and far superior in terms of selection and size. Additionally, reproductions are much better than in cheaper volumes from Taschen (978-3822813881) and Phaidon (978-0714828664). Maybe the reproductions in the monumental Oeuvre Katalog are superior, but at $2500 most of us will never aspire to own a copy.

Don't let other reviewer's gripes about color fidelity dissuade you from owning this marvelous volume.

Good retrospective, and good image quality.
This book is the most comprehensive collection of Max Ernst work. Having read the other reviews, I was concerned the print quality would be less than stellar. I find the print quality and color reproduction to be fine. No art book ever captures the full impact of the actual art, and color correction is one of the more problematic aspects of printing. MOMA and the Yale University did a good job with this book. This is a good collection of work and I wouldn't hesitate buying it again.

Ditto on the quality of the reproductions
I just saw the retrospective a couple of weeks ago as well and agree with the other reviewers: the exhibition is great, but the quality of the plates in the catalog is miserable.

Poor print quality
Having just seen the exhibit today (June 6 2005), and having perused copies of the book available at the exhibit, I concur that the color reproduction negates the highly informative text of this book. ... Read more

Product Description
Alongside Salvador Dalí and André Breton, Max Ernst remains one of the most famous names to be associated with Surrealism, and must now be regarded as one of the most original, prolific and best-known artists of the 20th century. Assembled in 1947, when Ernst had attained the height of his artistic powers, BEYOND PAINTING is a definitive autobiographical document of the painter and the creative processes behind his work, enhanced by testaments by many of his friends including fellow Surrealists André Breton, Paul Éluard, Roberto Matta and Hans Arp, as well as others such as New York art dealer Julien Levy. BEYOND PAINTING also contains over 150 illustrations dating from 1917-1947, including complete versions of Ernst's revolutionary experiments in frottage and collage, Natural History and The Lion of Belfort. Also included is a preface by New York artist Robert Motherwell and a chronology of Ernst's life written by the painter himself. Solar Art Directives features the most innovative artists of the 20th century. ... Read more

Customer Reviews (1)

BIG disappointment - don't buy
The book arrived in lightning speed, but the post office did its level best to destroy the book.That said, I opened it to find that there were lots of photos of Ernst's work, in very blurry B&W.His text is done in a whimsical fashion, describing himself in the third person often and really giving very little personal information.The essays by his friends are written in a surrealistic fashion and are more "look at me!" than they are truly about Ernst.VERY dissapointing - PASS. ... Read more

Product Description
Max Ernst, the great Surrealist artist, produced a body of graphic work that surpassed that of any other artist associated with Surrealism.His innovative printing techniques were the equivalent of the semi-automatic image-making procedures used by the painters and poets of his day, and his collaboration with the literary founders of Dada and Surrealism resulted in some of the most beautiful and evocative books of our time. In honor of the donation by Ernst's widow, Dorothea Tanning, of 150 of Ernst's etchings and lithographs--including the magnificent Maximiliana--The New York Public Library has mounted a major retrospective of his works.More than 200 books, prints, collages, and drawings, taken from the Library's collection and from private American and European collections, were selected for this exhibition--which will be displayed at The New York Public Library from October 11 to December 31, 1986, and will travel from there to the University of Michigan Art Museum, Ann Arbor.
Max Ernst:Beyond Surrealism--An Exhibition of the Artist's Books and Prints is a fully illustrated catalogue of the Max Ernst retrospective, with three essays documenting and interpreting the artist's books and prints, a chronology, selected bibliography, and illustrated checklist of the works in the exhibition.The first essay, by Robert Rainwater, surveys Ernst's printmaking in all media, from the linoleum cuts produced in his student years at the University of Bonn through the complex intaglio prints and transfer lithographs he created in collaboration with master French printers during the last 25 years of his life.The second, by Evan Maurer, discusses the themes and recurring forms in Ernst's prints and examines the artist's three great collage novels--La Femme 100 têtes (1929), Rêve d'une petite fille qui voulut entrer au carmel (1930), and Une Semaine de Bonté (1934).Maurer views the novels in the light of Ernst's entire career and discusses their sources and motivations. In a third essay, Anne Hyde Greet traces the evolution of the livre de peintre, or artist's book, in 20th-century France.She places Ernst's bookmaking activities in the context of this development, and, in the process, examines all his major illustrated books and gives a detailed study of his collaboration with the Russian futurist poet, printer, and publisher Iliazd (Ilia Zdanevich) on Maximiliana.
Not only a guide to the current exhibition, this book will stand as a provocative and insightful study of Max Ernst's contribution to 20th-century print and bookmaking. ... Read more

Customer Reviews (2)

THE ETERNAL RETURN
Study Max Ernst & you'll see the process behind the product. You'll see the alchemy behind the artistry. Max was a master, & has much to show us, particularly in this period. Wonder at the eididic patterns & at all that is eluded to, yet never expressed. Observe the black sun in "The Union of the Heavens & the Earth"--- here was a guy who knew a thing or two about a thing or two! This is not just an art book, it's a manual, pure & simple.

the lesser known Dali
In his text, Ulrich Bischoff proposes that Max Ernst had earned the right to be known as the leading exponant of Surrealist art of the 1940's and 50's, but since Salvador Dali knew how to present himself in society to greater effect, he inherited the title. Whatever one thnks of Dali's skill as a publicist, his work is different to Ernst's in one sense - Ernst's most potent paintings were done before he came to the U.S. It's interesting to theorise that it was because Ernst was harassed by the Nazis when they invaded France where the German Ernst lived, that he created the decalcomonia technique which decorates what I think are his greatest works - Joy of Life, The Robing of the Bride, Marlene, Europe after the Rain, Day and Night, The Eye of Silence and The Temptation of St. Anthony. This technique of applying the paint to the canvas by pressing it against a flat surface, gives the result a mossy, furry or marshy appearance. This coupled with Ernst's penchance for grotesque mythological figures would have aligned him with Jewish and other non-naturalistic artists considered decadent and perverse by the Third Reich's aesthetic. What makes Bischoff's collection of Ernst's paintings interesting is the evolution of Ernst's style, which would lead him to the decalcomania. As early as 1919 in Family Excursion one sees Ernst's sombre air. I also like The Master's Bedroom, It is worth spending a night in of 1920, done in his Dada period, with the symbolism of the animals, as evidence of Ernst's interest in Freud; the grattage works Vision Induced by the Nocturnal Aspect of the Porte St Denis 1927 and The Horde 1927; and the alien-like Human Form 1931. Even his most celebrated (and personally I think overrated) work, the biblical The Entire City 1935/36 is a prelude to the later beauty, wit and eroticism. Ernst's post- decalcomanic work seems to present him as more restful, perhaps not the best state for an artist. The images are pretty but the soul is at peace. Of note is the 1942 Surrealism and Painting, where he used what Jackson Pollock would later call "dripping". ... Read more

Product Description
The relevance of the art of Max Ernst (1891-1976) has boomed again in recent years, as a younger generation of painters takes inspiration from his hallucinated image horde and embraces his example as an artist devoted to self-renewal and the realms of the fantastical. Rock musicians and writers as diverse as Mission of Burma, Thurston Moore and J.G. Ballard have also drawn fruitfully on his achievements. Ernst's German Romantic iconography, reconceived in the Surrealist looking glass, is endlessly suggestive and generative: nighttime forests, caves and cliffs, dead moonlight, spectral faces and figures all populate his scenarios, and his ongoing relevance is further assured by his combination of this iconography with techniques such as collage, frottage, grattage and decalcomania, several of which were his own innovations. Max Ernst: Dream and Revolution assesses the entirety of this unique career. ... Read more

Customer Reviews (1)

innovative techniques in the art work of Max Ernst
For their unmistakable surrealist style, especially their amorphous forms and irrational juxtapositions, Max Ernst's art work is easily and commonly associated with dreams, as if the paintings are dreamscapes. This book of 15 or so essays by European art historians reiterates this reading of Ernst--but only as a steppingstone (or orientation) to the revolution entailed in the Ernst art works. This is not revolution as a theme (as with politics or history, for example) like dreams, but revolution in technique--with the making of art--which brought such originality and uniqueness to the art. A closing section titled "Max Ernst's Artistic Techniques" describes briefly the techniques collage, frottage, grattage, decalcomania, and oscillation used by Ernst to create his representations and effects.

Essays outside of introductory ones fall within sections on locations and respective time periods--e. g., France 1922-1941, America 1941-1953. Germany and Europe are other locations respectively preceding and following these locations. The locations and time periods are not by themselves germane in revealing or explaining anything because evolution, stages of development, and even biography do not have much use in comprehending the artist's work. When Ernst began his work in Germany, modernist art was flourishing. While Ernst is a major exemplar of modernist art, he was not a pioneer or explorer of it. Rather than biography with its implication of changes over time, Ernst is better comprehended by discerning and relating to the instinct and intuition inhering in the art and which are its sources. Ernst's paintings reflect the element of psychology pervading practically all parts of modernist culture. The paintings relate more to the Jungian concepts of archetypes rather than Freudian principles and ideas about personality or relationships. A chapter on the paintings' sources in "historical myths" in conjunction with Ernst's interest in Native American spirituality while he was in the Southwest U.S. explores this topic.

For Ernst, techniques were agencies to record his deepest senses. For most artists, especially modern artists, such a conscious concentration on technique would result in a formality or anonymity in painting. Abstract expression is a prime example of how technique can take over art. And so in ways are the works of Jackson Pollack and Philip Guston (to name only a couple of modernist artists); although technique does not take over their work nearly to the extent as with abstract expressionism. But Ernst was so open to the fertility of psychological life that technique was not like a constraint or impress, but rather like a catalyst bringing on highly original imagery. This is the angle from which this work comes to Max Ernst. In taking up extensively what may seem to be the specialized topic of technique and Ernst, the book actually gives a broad, germane understanding of the art in bringing together its creation and its perdurance. As introductory material brings up, a new generation of art lovers would benefit from an appreciation of his work beyond perennial interest in it simply for its exotic, often mystical style.
... Read more

Product Description
One of the major figures of Surrealism and Dada, Ernst created haunting, mysterious and sometimes whimsical images. He explored techniques such as collage, frottage and "drip" painting, and broadened the expressive options for generations of new artists, particularly the Abstract Expressionists. ... Read more

Customer Reviews (2)

Spectateur au hasard
Andre Breton s'interessait a la poesie creee au hasard. Ensuite son copain Max Ernst en faisait le meme dans l'art. Il representait, par des images creees au hasard, la super realite au-dela du quotidien. La dedans se melaient toutes les influences: de l'art dadaiste et expressioniste, des drogues, de l'hypnose, de la philosophie. Par son art - de collages, decalcomania, frottages, gouttages, grattages - il ouvrait la porte aux artistes de l'abstrait et du culture pop, de l'apres-guerre.

Viewer in the Dark
Surrealism founder Andre Breton wondered if random creating could work in art as it had in poetry. His friend Max Ernst made the effort by drawing on experimentation with hypnosis and mind-altering drugs, his own studies in philosophy, his years as an Expressionist and then Dada artist, and influences from fellow Surrealist Giorgio de Chirico. ERNST's collages, decalcomania, drippings, frottages, and grattages personalized images from the conscious and the unconscious into an eerily mysterious, unexpected super reality different from the waking world and not so easy to understand. He went on to influence post-war Abstract Expressionists and Pop artists, as seen by reading Carter Ratcliff's THE FATE OF A GESTURE and by viewing "Pollock." I used to think that the Dali dream sequence in the film "Spellbound" was the best glimpse of what Surrealism was about, but editor Jose Maria Faerna also gives a clear, compact view. This well-illustrated and organized book, along with his DE CHIRICO, shows what happened after William Vaughan's GERMAN ROMANTIC PAINTING. It also pigeonholes Ernst's place in Robert Motherwell's THE DADA PAINTERS AND POETS, Herbert Edward Read's A CONCISE HISTORY OF MODERN PAINTING, Peter Howard Selz's GERMAN EXPRESSIONIST PAINTING, and Patrick Waldberg's SURREALISM. ... Read more

Product Description
Published in conjunction with an exhibition of Max Ernst's work in Turin, this book includes almost 150 reproductions of his sculptures and collages. ... Read more

Customer Reviews (1)

good
I think this was an outstanding book.and the work was so original.I would like to reccomend this book to anyone of my age or any age.read the book. Dave is the bomb this was pretty cool Dave Tellez ... Read more

Product Description
A penetrating, intimate portrayal of the creative life of an individual artist and of the artistic life of the twentieth century.

Throughout his career, Max Ernst created fantastic worlds through images. But it is only when one sees his work in relation to the images of his personal life—his letters, photographs, poetry, and diaries, so brilliantly reproduced on these pages—that one begins to understand his world, a world spent at the epicenter of twentieth-century artistic life.

Max Ernst: Life and Work draws on an unprecedented collection of source material, much of it published here for the first time, to present a compelling portrait of the artist's life and an intellectual portrait of the period. Edited by Werner Spies, a close friend of Max Ernst and the leading authority on his extraordinarily rich, surreal world, it includes letters and notes by friends and contemporaries that provide insight into the reception of Ernst's oeuvre and shed light on his biography. The vast range of documents includes texts by Hans (Jean) Arp, André Breton, Louis Aragon, Paul éluard, Tristan Tzara, Man Ray, Benjamin Perêt, Lotte Lenya, Leonora Carrington, and many others.

Ernst's life and work were intimately interwoven, and the hundreds of documents here are interspersed with numerous reproductions of his work, all of which recall the variety and richness of the artist's discoveries and innovations. Ernst—dubbed "Dada Max"—played a vital role in the history of Dada and Surrealism in Cologne, Zurich, and Paris, and shaped the face of the New York art scene during his exile there. 615 illustrations, 154 in color. ... Read more

Customer Reviews (1)

Max Ernst incomplete but brillantly presented book
Max Ernst Life and Times is a different kind of biography. After reading Calvin Tomkins'
Duchampand Off the Wall - a portrait of Robert Rauschenberg,I had come to believe the biography of artist were the same. Neil Baldwin's, Man Ray - American Artistfurther reinforced this notion.However, Werner Spies book is a path not often taken. I suspect that the background of the authors, journalistic versus artistic has much to do with this difference.
Firstly, the book is beautiful in its glossy white high weight paper. The color plates are stunning (something lacking in Tomkins' books - again background differences).What I found disconcerting was who the text presented M.E. in an `at arms length' perspective.
The text is mainly letters and notes, some M.E. autobiographical entries strangely done in the 3rd person. Tomkins amerces you in the artist life and you feel an identity with situations and people. Spies' transcribs letter after letter (for some reason all shown in the book) to and from M.E.End result is a fragmented picture (surreal?) and not wholly fulfilling.
Now if Spies' format and Tomkins journalism got together....
Would I purchase this book again? Yes, but for the format and brilliant graphics. I will have to look elsewhere to read about Max Ernst.
... Read more

Product Description
A major visual exploration of the surreal art of Max Ernst, this monograph invites the reader to enter the colourful and sometimes menacing world of the artist. Designed to offer a fresh and stimulating look at Ernst's oeuvre. it represents and discusses the complete spectrum of his styles, from the early Expressionist-influenced paintings to the Dada and the magnificent, romantic Surrealist canvases. In addition, Gimferrer has included a number of sculptures which explore the disquieting interplay of mass and volume and a suite of collage novels. ... Read more

Customer Reviews (1)

Somewhat informative, but juvenile
This book reminded me of the biographies on Roberto Clemente and Teddy Roosevelt that I used to pick up in elementary school, but with slightly more technical subject matter.There are some interesting stories aboutDelbruck's life and discoveries, but these are written in a juvenile mannerand the book does not live up to its title- very little discussion of theimpact of molecular biology on other scientific fields or society ingeneral is provided.The important experiments of Delbruck, Luria, andothers are also described poorly.There are much better books on theorigins of molecular biology.For some fun, hagiographic info on Delbruckthis might work - for anything more, it won't. ... Read more