Dedal-e

Extremely rare first edition printed in 31 numbered copies of the second issue – only three issues were published – of this journal presented by the group “Les Réverbères.” Illustrated with wood cuts of painters Aline Gagnaire and Michel Tapié.
Small marginal tears on the top and bottom of the spine.
Unique copy complete with the 2 double-page color supplement (missing and unknown in the already preserved rare copies).
This journal of exceptional visual and literary quality marks one of the last attempts of the French artistic avant-garde before the start of the German oppression.
Dédal-e was published during the first months of the Occupation by a collective of Dada artists, the “Réverbères” club. This club was founded in 1938 in the painter Jean Marembert's workshop by the literary critic Michel Tapié de Céleyran, cousin three times removed of Henri de Toulouse-Lautrec. The members of the club, amongst which were the neo-dadaist writers Jacques Bureau, Pierre Minne and Henri Bernard, denounced the denomination of Surrealism in the French literary landscape and campaigned for the rehabilitation of Dada at impromptu evening parties in the Montparnasse district.
With the same objective, they published this typically Dada journal, designed and produced on a small scale in an entirely traditional manner. The pages of Dédal-e, the second issue in this collection, are real typographical masterpieces, combining literary texts using humour and vibrant color wood cuts. There are magnificent puns and spoonerisms, recapturing the extravagant spirit of the Dada pioneers, Tristan Tzara or Marcel Duchamp.