Plate III from "Fiat modes pereat ars" (Let There Be Fasion, Down with Art)

Plate III from "Fiat modes pereat ars" (Let There Be Fasion, Down with Art) 

『生まれよファッション 滅びよ芸術』III

Artist
ERNST, Max
エルンスト、マックス
Birth Year
1891
Death Year
1976
Date
1919 
Technique, Material, Format
lithograph 
Dimension
sheet: 45.5 x 33.0 cm 
Category
Print by Foreign Artist 
Inventory Number
83-PRF-002-03 

This work is regarded as Leaf III in an eight-leaf portfolio. It shows three dolls. In the upper right is a male figure whose bowler hat and torso are connected by a screw. Directly below him is a female figure with frizzy hair, a lightbulb-like head and short skirt. To her left is an armless male figure with frizzy hair emerging from a cleft in his head. Both their feet are rounded like a roly-poly toy. Ball-jointed legs or arms connect the three figures. The lower body of the man on the left and woman are aligned on an axis. Beside the woman is written: "bräutliche mattung" (bride’s tiredness) while above the man on the left is "Letzte kreaktion durch MODEspaltung" (the division of fashion leading to the ultimate creaction [a coined term combining "creation" and "action"]), and below that is “non plus umbra” (climax of darkness). Leaf III is considered to be the most erotic of the works in this portfolio.
(NAKAMURA Naoaki)

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