Paysage aux Fantasmes. Landscape with Fantasies by Jean Dubuffet, 1901-1985

Jean Dubuffet, 1901-1985
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Paysage aux Fantasmes. Landscape with Fantasies

Original lithograph in black ink. 1953. Signed and dated in pencil. Inscribed by Dubuffet with the title. Numbered in pencil from the edition of 20 impressions only. Printed at the studio of Mourlot, 1953. Very rare.
Ref: Webel 381.

Excellent rich impression. On sale cream wove Arches paper. Generally excellent condition; slight trace of old mount tape visible on the reverse only. Full margins. Sheet: 19?x25 7/8?. Image overall approx: 18?x21?. (458x554mm).

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At the beginning of the 1950?s Dubuffet?s graphic work reached a peak of creative impetus. He was fascinated and much inspired by the actual processes of lithography, by the way that random effects of inking, brushwork and scraping could create forms which seemed to derive not from conscious drawing but from the subconscious mind in the manner that the Surrealists had investigated through ?automatic writing? in the 1930?s. He worked mostly at the studio of Mourlot, where he had drawn his first lithographs in the 1940?s.

Pasage aus Fantasmes is one of the great compositions of this inspired period of his graphic work in the early 1950?s. Liquid washes, brush and finger-work, scraping and the flow of the ink itself create forms which seem to appear and disappear as our eye moves over the surface of the sheet. Dubuffet sometimes referred to the works of this period as Phénomènes - Phenomena - and this expresses much of the concept behind them. They are unique and magisterial works in the history of the graphic art of the twentieth century, and rarely seen as the editions which Dubuffet printed were so small, in this case 20 impressions only.