À toute épreuve

Name: À toute épreuve
SKU: 20266
Author: Paul Éluard

Paris, Éditions surréalistes, (15 octobre) 1930.

7 pamphlets of [16] and [15] pp., bound together in one volume (65 × 105 mm). Natural calf, dyed and impressed with an original etching in pastel shades of pink, yellow and blue, inspired by the typography of the title page; edge-to-edge doublures with the same design; title in palladium on the upper cover; pale aqua-green velvet goatskin endleaves; edges gilt in white gold by Jean-Luc Bongrain; matching chemise and slipcase (binding signed Louise Bescond — titling by Claude Ribal, 2025).

First edition. One of only 30 copies on China paper (no. 27).

Yves Tanguy’s copy, inscribed by Paul Éluard:

“Exemplaire d’Yves Tanguy, son vieil ami fidèle, Paul Éluard.”

[“Yves Tanguy’s copy, from his old faithful friend, Paul Éluard.”]

An exceptional composite copy comprising seven bound-in booklets: the China-paper issue, a regular-paper copy, four additional copies on colored papers (salmon, green, yellow and pink), and Victor Hugo’s Lettre à Lord Palmerston (Jersey, 1854), the documented typographical model that inspired Éluard’s design for À toute épreuve.

The association is particularly significant: Éluard and Tanguy were close figures within the Surrealist circle, and Éluard affectionately referred to the painter as his “druid.”

The combination of one of the 30 deluxe copies, the presentation to Yves Tanguy, the complete sequence of colored-paper issues, and the Victor Hugo prototype makes this one of the outstanding surviving copies of À toute épreuve. Bound by Louise Bescond.

Only two other inscribed copies on China paper are known, while the comparable copies preserved at the Bibliothèque nationale de France and formerly in the Geneviève and Jean-Paul Kahn collection lack this remarkable conjunction of features.

#20266

Back