Man Ray | Alphabet pour Adultes

Man Ray

Alphabet pour Adultes. Paris: Editions Pierre Belfond, 1970

Folio (375 x 280 mm). Original rayograph signed "Man Ray" and numbered 46/150, mounted on wood veneer and card stock, signed "Man Ray" in pencil to limitation leaf, 38 lithographs including cover and title page; wood veneer slightly lifting, light offsetting to leaves opposite lithographs, a few spots to cover and an area of discoloration. Original wrappers, loose as issued. Publisher's original orange cloth box, author's facsimile signature to spine.

First edition of the signed French edition, numbered 46 of 150, with an original rayograph and lithographs.

Rather than simply translating and republishing the existing drawings from the first English edition of Alphabet for Adults (1948), Man Ray crafted an entirely new set of illustrations and words for this edition printed on large vélin d'Arches. Some examples range from clear corresponding depictions of the word, whilst others lean heavily into the artist's Surrealist wheelhouse: "rire" (to laugh) with lithographic illustration of a bell, "votre" (your) depicting a letter with jumbled handwriting. Diverging from child-like connotations and remembrances of alphabet books and primers, Alphabet pour adultes in title and in imagery evokes a mature and abstract relationship with our everyday language.