Titres et pains perdus

Between 1944 and 1948, Pierre Alechinsky studied book illustration, typography, printing techniques and photography at the École nationale supérieure d’Architecture et des Arts visuels de La Cambre in Brussels. During this period he discovered the work of Henri Michaux, Jean Dubuffet and the Surrealists, before, fifteen years later, following a revelatory stay in the United States, discovering acrylic paint, to which Walasse Ting introduced him.

Titres et pains perdus is his first published book, combining photographs, collages, texts and illustrations. It also includes photographs by Suzy Embo and reproductions of works by René Bertholo. Published in early 1965, it led André Breton — a year before his death — to invite Alechinsky to take part in the 21st International Surrealist Exhibition, L’Écart Absolu.

A first monograph followed the next year, Le Tout Venant, and his first illustrated books appeared in 1967 and 1968: L’Espace d’un doute, with Jean-Jacques Levêque, published by PAB, then Le Bleu des fonds, published by Éditions Le Soleil Noir, with Joyce Mansour, in 1968.

“I have always attached great importance to titles, both for my paintings and for my books. In fact, the word ‘titre’ appears three times in my books: first there was Titres et pains perdus, which carries a subtitle not to be underestimated: Notes sur les disparitions, les pertes de sens, les difficultés de transmission, les oublis, les manques et les persistances inutiles.” (Le Carnet et les Instants, no. 205, 2020).

A fine provenance: the copy of Romain Gary and Jean Seberg. The star of Breathless had married the author of Promise at Dawn two years earlier, on 16 October 1963, in the small Corsican village of Sarrola — discreetly, after a flight chartered from Paris by the secret services. The couple subsequently lived in Paris, on the rue du Bac.