My Proposal

This is a beautiful image from Miro's most celebrated livres d'artistes A Toute Epreuve. Notice how Miro uses Paul Eluard's poem as the body of the bird walking away from the centre of the page. On the right page is a whimsical bird with a central eye and the iconic ladder body. Miro spent over 10 years between conception and final publication with the creation of 253 woodblocks requiring over 42,000 passes through the press to create a magnificent work of 52 folded sheets of interwoven image and text. The juxtaposition of image and text become inseparable components of the work.

My Proposal

My proposal was sent to Tony Bond stating that I would like an internship to work with the AGNSW to plan and prepare, within a curatorial context, an exhibition of livres d’artiste. The exhibition will focus on this very popular and spectacular art form showing some of the most beautiful graphic works produced by the 20th century European Masters in the post war period.

The livres d’artiste is an elegant and masterful limited edition of art in which the artist combines a series of exclusively designed fine art prints with literature. The size, presentation and the high quality materials is a special characteristic of the livres d’artiste. They display the imaginative and varied relationships between image and text created by these artists. The print makers of these works are also considered the grandmasters of European fine art graphics having detailed and intimate knowledge of the artist’s preferences and with a unique ability to produce prints reflecting the artist’s intentions. To paraphrase Matisse, the livres d’artiste is a work that is meant to be looked at and admired but not read.

My aim will be to select the best and most renowned works from among the most prominent 20th century European masters. I would aim to exhibit between 2 to 4 livres d’artistes depending on the number of pages and images in each work. As a starting point, I suggested the selection be considered from, but not limited to;

1. Marc Chagall. Four Tales from Arabian Nights. 1948, Published Pantheon
2. Jean Miro. Ubu Roi 1966. Written by Alfred Jarry, Published Teriade
3. Henri Matisse. Jazz. 1947. Written by Matisse, Published Teriade
4. Fernand Leger. Cirque. 1950. Written by Leger, Published Teriade
5. Pablo Picasso – One of many to be chosen but example Sable Mouvant,(1966) Written by Pierre Reverdy, Published Broder

I had spoken with MOMA and they confirmed that they own a copy of each of these works.

The objective would be to produce a complete planning document, which will include some or all of the following,

Develop the conceptual shape of exhibition
Select the works
Organise loans of works from appropriate institutions (please note the works nominated are available from MOMA.)
Develop public lecture and other education programs
Prepare marketing and press plan
Identify sponsorship opportunities
Prepare budget
Prepare draft catalogue and other documentation.Prepare interior exhibition design
Prepare installation plan