2013/09/02

Yves Tanguy and Multiplication of the Arcs: Chapter 1: Life, Works and Discussions.

      NAGAO Takashi

1.Life and Works

      Here I simply describe the life and works of Yves Tanguy. I focus on Tanguy’s oil works, but I will refer to drawings, etchings and objects as needed throughout the course of the discussion.
      Raymond Georges Yves Tanguy was born on January 5th, 1900 in Paris, at the Ministry of Naval Affairs on Place de la Concorde. His family had been sailors for generations. His father, Félix Tanguy (1851-1908) was from Brest. After serving as the captain of a route across the ocean, he became the superviser of junior officers at the Ministry. His mother, Thérèse Coadou (1860-1936) was from a religious farmer family in Plogonnec, Brittany, with many of its members involved in the church. Yves Tanguy had many older siblings, Emilie (1888-1972), René (1892-1966) and Henri (1896-1914).
      Tanguy’s father Félix passed away in 1907. After that, Yves was left in the care of his relatives for about four years. From 1912 he went to the Lycée Montaigne in Paris and he became acquainted with Pierre Matisse. Matisse was son to the painter Henri Matisse, and would later become an art dealer. In 1914, one of his brothers, Henri, died in the war. In 1916, his mother retired to the “prieuré,” her house in Locronan, a small village of Brittany. Yves and his sister Emilie remained in Paris, but they spent their vacations in Locronan.
     In 1918, Tanguy boarded the merchant ship as apprentice officer and cicumnavigated Africa, Portugal, Britain, Brazil and Argentina. After this eighteen-month voyage Tanguy was drafted to the Army in 1920 and assigned to infantry in Lunéville, where he became acquainted with Jacques Prévert who would become a poet later. They quickly hit it off. After that, Tanguy volunteered to go to Africa and was sent to Tunisia, where he finished his duty time.
     In 1922, Tanguy returned to Paris, and was reunited with Prévert. Together, they drifted from one job to another. It was probably in this period, when Tanguy encoutered Giorgio de Chirico’s work and began to paint. The following year, he began to live together with Prévert and his friend, Marcel Duhamel, at the Rue de Château 54. At the same time, Tanguy met Jannette Ducrocq who would become his first wife.


[fig.1] Yves Tanguy, Untitled, 1924.


[fig.2] Yves Tanguy, The Church of Locronan, 1924.

     At that time Tanguy was painting the city objects of Paris and the landscape of Locronan with expressionist deformation [fig.1, 2]. Florent Fels, the editer of the magazine L’art vivant, found these works, and exhibited three of them at the Salon de l’araignée in 1925. At the same time, Duhamel gave Tanguy painting tools with which he painted Rue de la santé, his first oil work [fig.3]. Fels introduced Tanguy to some surrealists and soon the house of the Rue de Château became a surrealist meeting place. In December of this year, Tanguy met André Breton and became a member of the surrealist group.


fig.3Yves Tanguy, Rue de la Santé, 1925.


     In 1926, the works of Tanguy changed from real landscape to symbolic image, where a few motifs were arranged in a vast space [fig.4-6]. These works were soon inserted into La révolution surréaliste, the magazine of the surrealist group. Then the amorphous beings, which would be leitmotif of Tanguy’s later work, appeared in The Storm (Black Landscape) [fig.7] and in Dark Moon [fig.8]. These amorphous beings gradually came to dominate Tanguy’s canvas over the next year. And from May to June 1927 the exposition “Yves Tanguy and American Objects” was held at the Galerie surrealiste. The foreword of the exhibition catalogue was written by Breton, and after that Tanguy became one of the representative painters of surrealism. Tanguy adored Breton and continued to support him even during the frequent group divisions.


fig.4Yves Tanguy, The Phare, 1926.

fig.5Yves Tanguy, Title Unknown, 1926.



fig.6Yves Tanguy, Genesis, 1926.


[fig.7] Yves Tanguy, The Storm (Black Landscape), 1926.





fig.8Yves Tanguy, Dark Moon, 1926.

     In 1928, the basic structure of Tanguy’s image was established. Thereafter, Tanguy continued to paint the amorphous beings undulating in a vast empty space [fig.9-11]. Also in this year, Tanguy parted ways with Rue de Château, and began to live with Jannette whom he had married the year before. In 1930, they traveled to Nouth Africa. Though Tanguy did not typically make plans or sketches when he painted, in some works after this trip, he did. The particularity of these works is that the amorphous beings often blend into the upheaved ground [fig.12-13].




[fig.9] Yves Tanguy, Old Horizon, 1927.


[fig.10] Yves Tanguy, Unspoken Depth, 1928.

[fig.11] Yves Tanguy, The Lovers, 1929.


[fig.12] Yves Tanguy, Promontry Palace, 1930.


fig.13Yves Tanguy, The Armoire of Proteus, 1931.

     After technical trial and error, Tanguy’s works began to show technical sophistication in the 1930s. In his works of 1920s works, space and color were often dim and silhouettes of beings were often ambiguous. On the contrary, the 1930s works show clearer space and brighter color, and the silhouettes of beings become clearer and solider [fig.14-16]. In June 1935, his second solo exhibiton was held at the Gallery of Cahier d’art, and in November of the same year, his first solo exhibition in the United States was held at the Stanley Rose Gallery in Hollywood. Additionally, in 1938 a solo exhibition was held at the Guggenheim Jeune in London. Thus Tanguy received some publicity as a surrealist painter, but his life was always distressed. In 1936, his mother passed away, and the “prieuré” was succeeded by his sister, Emilie, so Tanguy‘s connection with Locronan weakened.



fig.14Yves Tanguy, Title Unknown, 1931.


fig.15Yves Tanguy, Globe of Ice , 1934.


fig.16Yves Tanguy, Lingering Day, 1937.




fig.17Yves Tanguy, The Palace of Windoed Rocks, 1942

    In 1939, thanks to Kay Sage, an American painter Tanguy had met the year before, he transfered himself to the United States along with many other French surrealists, and eventually acquired citizenship. The following year, Tanguy traveled West with Sage, and got married in Reno. In 1941, they moved to Woodbury, Connecticut, from Greenwich Village. In 1946, they began to live in a house named “Town Farm.”
     After moving to the U. S., Tanguy’s works acquired clearer and vivider color and the amorphous beings often were large in relation to the canvas. This resulted in a general impression that the beings and space were becoming larger and larger [fig.17-20].




fig.18Yves Tanguy, Infinite Divisibility, 1942.




fig.19Yves Tanguy, Zone of Instability, 1943.
     
fig.20Yves Tanguy, My Life, White and Black, 1944.


      In 1946, André Breton who had been in hiding in the United States along with Tanguy returned to France. However as Tanguy remained in Woodbury with Sage, his links with surrealism in Paris gradually faded. In addition, because Breton disliked Sage, Tanguy’s relationship with Breton had become discordant. And after a dispute over Tanguy’s exhibition at the gallery Nina Doucet in 1949, Tanguy ended the relationship. As such when Tanguy and Sage traveled around Europe in 1953, visiting Paris and Brittany, Tanguy did not reunite with Breton.



fig.21Yves Tanguy, Fear II, 1949.


fig.22Yves Tanguy, Rose of Four Wind, 1950.


[fig.23] Yves Tanguy, This Morning, 1951.


fig.24Yves Tanguy Mirage of the Time, 1954.


[fig.25Yves Tanguy, From Green to White, 1954

     In Tanguy’s works from the late 1940s to 1950s, his amorphous beings grew sharper, splitting and growing in number [fig.21-25]. This proliferation of beings culminated in Multiplication of the Arcs [fig.26] in 1954. It was this year when a co-exhibition with Sage was held at the Wadsworth Atheneum, Hartford. This was the last exhibiton of his lifetime. After this exhibition, Tanguy completed his final work, The Imaginary Numbers. He passed away due to a brain hemorrhage on January 15th 1955.


fig.26Yves Tanguy, Multiplication of the Arcs, 1954.


2. Pre-1980s Discussions about Tanguy

     As the foundation for the main issue of the present dissertation, let us refer to the preceding discussions about Tanguy.
     The first monography about Tanguy is Yves Tanguy by André Breton[1]. This was published during the retrospective exhibition in 1946 organized by Pierre Matisse, an old friend of Tanguy and his art dealer. It was designed by Marcel Duchamp, and contains Tanguy’s works and Breton’s essays on Tanguy with a foreford in French and English. This is the only monography that Breton ever wrote.
    When Tanguy passed away suddenly in 1955, the retrospective exhibition was held at the Museum of Modern Art in New York. One of Tanguy’s friends, Jamese Thrall Soby edited the catalogue of this ehibition. This was the first publication to overview chronologically Tanguy’s life and works. The introduction is based on “Inland in the Subconscious: Yves Tanguy[2] which was written in 1949, and later became representative of essays on Tanguy. After Tanguy’s death, Marcel Jean, a friend and painter, also wrote an essay about Tanguy’s life: “Yves Tanguy: Peintre de la voie lactée[3],” which was inserted in his The History of the Surrealist Painting[4] later.
     In 1963, Tanguy’s second wife, Kay Sage, and Pierre Matisse published the catalogue raisonné of Tanguy[5]. This catalogue contains 463 works. Even now this is the only catalogue raisonné concerning Tanguy. However, since there are still many works which aren’t included, such as drawings and etchings, a new catalogue is being edited by the Foundation Pierre and Maria-Gaetana Matisse[6].
     In addition, a catalogue of the exhibition in 1976 edited by Wolfgang Wittrock[7] contains all the etching works, and a portfolio edited by Daniel Marchesseau[8] contains the works which do not appear in the catalogue raisonné.
     Patrick Waldberg, one of Tanguy’s friends with a close relationship to Surrealism, wrote the first biography about Tanguy[9]. Published in 1977, it contains many testimonials from Tanguy’s family, friends and Waldberg himself, making it a valuable document about Tanguy. Another testimonial is from Tanguy’s friend, Marcel Duhamel’s autobiography Don’t talk about your life, published in 1977[10]. Duhamel lived together with Tanguy and Jacques Prévert in the Rue de Château 54, so his biography offers us a valuable glimpse into this period of Tanguy’s life.

3. Discussions about Tanguy after the 1980s

       It was about 1980 when researchers began to pay attention to Tanguy. In 1979, Renée Mabin wrote her doctoral thesis about Tanguy[11]. From 1982-1983, the first large retrospective exhibitions were held in France, Germany and United States. There are some differences among the catalogues of each of these countries. The catalogue of Pompidou Center, France[12], contains essays by Jean Maurel, Roland Penrose, Robert Lebel, José Pierre and Thomas Solley, and many articles concerning Tanguy written until then, along with a detailed chronology and bibliography. That of Baden-Baden Museum, Germany[13], contains the German translations of the essays above (except for Maurel’s), the articles, the chronology and the bibliography, and in addition essays by the reseachers, Katharina Schmidt, Reinhold Hohl and Marienne Kesting. Schmidt’s essay is an overview; Hohl’s is an attempt to place Tanguy’s image in the course of three-dimensional works of surrealism; Kesting’s examines a relationship between Tanguy’s image and literature. The Catalogue of Guggenheim Museum[14] in the U.S. contains only Penrose’s essay. In addition to the catalogues, one of Tanguy’s friends, Gordon Onslow-Ford, published Yves Tanguy and Automatism[15].
     In 1983, Jennifer Mundy published the essay “Tanguy, Titles and Mediums[16].” She showed that during his first solo exhibition in 1927, Tanguy and Breton took titles from Charles Richet’s Traité de metapsychique[17]. In 1988, Susan Nessen published an essay titled “Yves Tanguy’s Otherworld, Reflections on a Celtic Past and a Surrealist Sensibility[18].” In this essay, she tried to look at Tanguy’s image in relation to the Celtic climate of Brittany. A tendency to connect Tanguy with Brittany and Celt is found in many writers, since André Breton referred to Brittany’s legendary city Ys in the foreword of Tanguy’s first solo exhibition.
     An extreme example of this tendency is Yves Tanguy: Druide surréaliste[19] published in 1995 and written by Tanguy’s niece, Geneviève Morgan-Tanguy. This book is not about Tanguy himself but his family. Though most of this book is dedicated to Tanguy’s father, mother, brother and sister, it contains important letters and testimonies from them concerning Tanguy..
     Two years prior to this biographiy, Letters from Far: Address to Marcel Jean[20] was published. Tanguy very rarely referred to himself as a 20th century painter or as a surrealist painter, making this book of letters a rare and valuable testimony of Tanguy himself. It allows us to grasp the complicated emotion from Tanguy who remained in United States after World War II, regarding Breton and Surrealism in Paris. Unfortunately, Tanguy wrote about his creation and works very scarcely. There is also Liliane Rieu’s book[21] from the 1990s, which is a kind of poetic text.
     In 2001, the monographies of Tanguy were published in France, Germany and United States. The French version[22] contains an overview concerning Tanguy’s life by René le Bihan and Martica Sawin and a biography by Renée Mabin but nothing particularly new. The reproductions inserted there are only oils and gouaches and there are no drawings and etchings and very few works of other artists.
     On the other hand, the exhibition catalogue held at Houston and Stuttgart, Yves Tanguy and Surrealism[23], contains many drawings, etchings, and other artists’ work which can be compared with Tanguy’s. Aditionally, as testimonies of the artists influenced by Tanguy, it contains essays by Gordon Onslow-Ford and Konrad Klapheck. Other essays are written by Karin von Maur, Beate Wolf, Susan Davidson. Maur’s is an overview concerning the life and work of Tanguy. Wolf’s is also an overview concerning Tanguy’s graphic works (drawing, etching, etc…). Davidson’s concerns Tanguy’s movement and reception in the United States.
      In 2007, the first large-scale exhibition of Tanguy in France since 1982 was held at Quimper. This exhibition was also held at Barcelona [24]. The catalogue of this exhibition, Yves Tanguy: Univers of Surrealism[25],  contains essays by André Cariou, Werner Spies, Didier Ottinger, Renée Mabin, Gérard Durozoi, Louis Reyes-Tanguy, Jean-Jacques Lebel, Lucía García de Carpi and Isabelle Derveaux, and cites many letters related to Tanguy which had never been accessible. In the same year, Josick Mingam’s, Yves Tanguy Surrealist: “The Certitude of Never Seen”: Psychoanalytique Essay[26], was published. There are two recently published catalogues of the exhibition, Tanguy Calder, edited by Susan Davidson[27], and Double Solitaire: The Surreal Worlds of Kay Sage and Yves Tanguy[28].
     In Japan, until now the only exhibiton held was that of etchings, held at the Satani Gallery[29]. In addition, in the 1990s there used to be a personal museum of Yves Tanguy at Zushi in Kanagawa prefecture[30]. There were also the feature articles about Tanguy by such authors as Okada Takahiko and Iwaya Kunio[31] in the art magazine Mizue in 1970 and 1983[32].

4. The Regional Origin Theory

      Then concretely, what have critics discussed about Tanguy until now? Generally speaking, most of the discussions about Tanguy focused on two problems: “What is the origin of Tanguy’s image?” And, “What are the beings Tanguy paints?” The common strategy for responding to these questions is making reference to the regions Tanguy visited. Iwaya Kunio criticized this strategy calling it the “regional origin theory.” The most prominent relation is that with Brittany.
      Tanguy’s parents were from Brittany. Though Tanguy himself grew up in Paris after his father’s death in 1908, he did spend four years at his relative’s home in Brittany. He regularly visited Locronan, a little village in Brittarny to which his mother retired when he was sixteen. That did not change even after he began to live together with Jacques Prévert and Marcel Duhamel at the house of Rue de Château, and joined the Surrealist movement with them. Additionally, according to their will, the ashes of Tanguy and his wife were buried at a seashore of Douarnenez, near Locronan.
       Many critics have refered to the relationship of Tanguy’s images with Brittany’s particuler climate and culture, which is considered borderland of France. Also relics of celtic culture remain there very strongly, so critics have called attention to the ressemblence betweeen Tanguy’s images and the celtic legends, the Megaliths of Menhils and Dolmens [fig.27], and the strongly abstract celtic arts. The reperesentatives of this interpretive strategy are the already mentioned essay of Nessen and Tanguy’s niece’s biography. However, it can also be found in the monographies of recent years. For example, in Yves Tanguy and Surrealism (2001), the photograph of the seashore near Douarnenez is found in the same page as The Multiplication of the Arcs (1954), one of Tanguy’s latest works [fig.28] [33]. Similar comparisons had already been done in the doctoral thesis of Renée Mabin in 1979[34].



fig.27Megaliths of Carnac





fig.28Finistère, Douarnenez,
Seashore near the Roche blanche
Maur (2001), p.127

      In addition, examples of the “regional origin theory” other than Brittany is Africa, where Tanguy visited in 1930, and the United States to where he exiled himself. As mentioned, Tanguy traveled around north Africa and after this trip he painted five works in a differrent style than his previous works. Though Tanguy typically didn’t plan in advance or sketch, in some works after this trip he exceptionaly did some sketches. The particularity of these works is the upheaved ground. Some critics connect these images with the landscape of north Africa.
     Tanguy went to the United States in 1939, and traveled around the West with Kay Sage the next year. They also visited the couple of Max Ernst and Drothea Tanning in Arizona later. Some critics consider the landscape of the West, desert and canyon, the origin of Tanguy’s works in the United States[35].
       Robert Lebel had already called for reconsideration for the “regional origin theory,” in the catalogue of retrospective exhibition in 1982[36]. Iwaya Kunio also said: 

In a sense, the work of Tanguy shows the character of the twentieth century the best, so there would be no problem if one could interpret it by the climate or by the familiar origin. In contrast it is superficial to think that Tanguy’s memory of Brittany’s climate brought about his work’s landscape. On the contrary, it would be more accurate to think of Tanguy’s landscape as connecting to a universality which just happens to bring up the climate of Brittany in our minds[37].

Iwaya also suggested that, as borderland of France, Brittany probably instilled “a tendency to see the French culture from outside” or “an internal sense of other.” Of course, it is needless to deny the regional origin theory completely. Tanguy’s family was from Brittany and he adored it. In addition, there is a testimony that when Tanguy was a little boy, he often sketched the megaliths with his brothers[38]. In empahasizing these facts too much, however, we risk becoming blind to the other contexts.
      Many critics have seen things not pertaining to the regional origin theory in Tanguy‘s image: the Totem pole of Native Americans, the works of Bosch or Brügel, the landscape paintings of tne Netherlands in the 17th century, the works of Chardin, the Sagrada Familia Cathedral of Gaudy, the Odradek of Kafka, Strange machines of Russel, the vowel of Rimbaud and the music of Satie, etc [39]. Some critics have also considered the transition of Tanguy’s images as “the generation of a new world[40].” They remain, however, always at the level of speculation. As Iwaya said, probably because of Tanguy’s image connecting to “universality,” one could see various images in it. Yoshimasu Gouzou says:

When I look at Yves Tanguy’s work, I feel that a great amount of words which invite fantasy surge forth, and I tried to restrain these words which might render Yves Tanguy’s work a series of fragmentary images. If possible, I want to discuss Tanguy’s work using very few words. It seems, however, that Tanguy’s works call forth an extraordinary number of words[41].

Okada Takahiko also says:

Because the work of Tanguy seems to have a wealth of differing elements, if interpreted with everyday words, too many metaphorical descriptions are possible. If left as is, such descripitions are quickly overrun by contradictions. It may seem like a paradox, but it is this property which leads Mondrian to say “too abstract.” Because it is archetypical or primordial in nature, Tanguy’s work permits a great variety of metaphors[42].

Then why must many critics continue to discuss the regional origin theory and literary metaphors when they write about Tanguy? The cause is, paradoxically, a kind of  “clearness” in the images Tanguy paints.
      Although it is very difficult to describe his images, the stylistic transition of his works is very clear. The basic style, in which the amorphous beings are arranged in a vast space, did not change from 1928 to his later years. Adding to this, the catalogue raisonné, edited by Pierre Matisse and Kay Sage, provided a clear overview of his works. As mentioned, Tanguy scarcely used words in reference to his works and creations. In discussing Surrealism, the theoretical issues are inevitable. However, concerning Tanguy, it is difficult to discuss these, because Tanguy himself scarcely talked about them. So concerning Tanguy, neither stylistic issues nor theoretical issues arose. Moreover, in Tanguy’s image following 1928, the state of the motif changes but the motif itself does not. Consequently there is not much room for Iconology. That is to say, it is difficult to discuss Tanguy in the orthodox way of Art History.
      As shown, due to his stylistic transition being clear; the lack of theoretical issues, the unchanging motif and the structure of the image also bring clarity. This does not mean, however, that the image of Tanguy itself is clear. Presicely because of the clearness of Tanguy’s image, there are no issues to discuss resulting in unclearness. After all, we cannot discuss it. What remain are the facts about Tanguy’s life. Therefore critics have no choice but to connect Tanguy’s work to biographical facts. Thus the regional origin theory became predominent. The only other choice was to enumerate literary metaphors, while recognizing that it is ultimately impossible to interpret Tanguy’s images.
      In sum. It is after the 1980s that reseachers began to pay attention to Tanguy at the level of the testimonies of familiars. The principle reference books now, include the catalogue raisonné edited by Matisse and Sage, and the catalogues of retrospective exhibition at Pompidou Center (1982), Stuttgart, and Houston (2001). In addition, discussions about Tanguy until now tend toward the regional origin theory and the enumeration of literary metaphors.
       Then how does one discuss Tanguy without depending on these trends? The next chapter will be a discussion about Tanguy focusing on the difficulity of discussion itself.





Abbreviations:
  • Brion (1961): Marcel Brion, Art fantastique, Albin Michel, Paris, 1961.
  • Cariou (2007): André Cariou (ed.), Yves Tanguy: L’univers surréaliste (exh.cat.), Musée des beaux-arts (Quimper), Somogy, Paris, 2007.
  • Duhamel (1972): Marcel Duhamel, Raconte pas ta vie, Mercure de France, Paris, 1972.
  • Iwaya (1986): Iwaya Kunio, "Yves Tanguy's 'History'," in: Surrealists: Eyes and Mysteries, Seido-sya, 1986, pp.40-70(巖谷國士「イヴ・タンギーの「歴史」」『シュルレアリストたち 眼と不可思議』青土社、1986pp.47-70).
  • Jean (1955): Marcel Jean, “Yves Tanguy: Peintre de la voie lactée,” in: Lettres Nouvelles, no.25, Paris, Mars 1955, pp.367-379.
  • Le Bihan (2001): René Le Bihan, Renée Mabin, Martica Sawin, Yves Tanguy, Palantines, Quimper, 2001.
  • Mabin (1979): Renée Mabin, Yves Tanguy: Peintre surréaliste (Thèse), Université de Bretagne occidentale, 1979.
  • Matisse (1963): Pierre Matisse, Kay Sage (eds.), Yves Tanguy: Un recueil de ses œuvres / A Summary of His Works, Pierre Matisse, New York, 1963.
  • Maur (2001): Karin von Maur (ed.), Yves Tanguy und der Surrealismus (exh.cat.), Staatsgalerie Stuttgart, Hatje Canz, Ostfildern-Ruit, 2000; John Brownjohn, John S. Southard (tr.), Yves Tanguy and Surrealism (exh.cat.), The Menil Collection (Houston), Hatje Canz, Ostfildern-Ruit, 2001.
  • Morgane-Tanguy (1995): Geneviève Morgane-Tanguy, Yves Tanguy: Druide surréaliste, Fernand Lanore, Paris, 1995.
  • Mundy (1983): Jennifer Mundy, ”Tanguy, Titles and Mediums,” in: Art History, vol.6, no.2, June 1983, pp.199-213.
  • Nessen (1988): Susan Nessen, “Yves Tanguy’s Otherworld, Reflections on a Celtic Past and a Surrealist Sensibility” in: Arts Magazine, vol.62, no.5, New York, January 1988, pp.22-29.
  • Okada (1985): Okada Takahiko, "Shadow of Disappearing Existence," in: Mizue, no.791, Bijyutu-syuppan-sya, December 1970, reprinted in: Cultivating Dreams: Painter of Fantasy, Ozawa-syoten, 1985, p.170-180(岡田隆彦「消えてゆく存在の影」『みづゑ』791、美術出版社、197012pp.19-27; 岡田隆彦「消えてゆく存在の影 ―― タンギー」『夢を耕す 幻想画家論』小沢書店、1985pp.170-180).
  • Onslow-Ford (2002): Gordon Onslow-Ford, Yves Tanguy and Automatism, Bishop Pine Press, Inverness (California), 1983; Jean-Pierre Guillon (tr.), Yves Tanguy et l’automatisme, La digitale, Quimperlé, 2002.
  • Rétrospective (1982): Yves Tanguy: Rétrospective 1925-1955 (exh.cat.), Centre Geoges Pompidou, Paris, 1982.
  • Richet (1922): Charles Richet, Traité de métapsychique, Félix Alcan, Paris, 1922.
  • Schmidt (1982): Katharina Schmidt (ed.), Yves Tanguy (exh.cat.), Staatliche Kunsthalle Baden-Baden, Prestel-Verlag, München, 1982.
  • Soby (1949): James Thrall Soby, “Inland in the Subconscious: Yves Tanguy,” in: Magazine of Art, vol.42, New York, January 1949, pp.2-7.
  • Soby (1955): James Thrall Soby (ed.), Yves Tanguy (exh.cat.), The Museum of Modern Art, New York, 1955.
  • Tanguy (1993): Yves Tanguy, Lettres de loin: Adressées à Marcel Jean, Le Dilettante, Paris, 1993.
  • Waldberg (1977): Patrick Waldberg, Yves Tanguy, André de Rache, Bruxelle, 1977.
  • Wittrock (1976): Wolfgang Wittrock (ed.), Yves Tanguy, Das druckgraphische Werk (exh.cat.), Kunst-Handel, Düsseldorf, 1976.
Notes

[1] André Breton, Yves Tanguy, Pierre Matisse, New York, 1946. Breton’s essays in this book (except for Foreword) are contained in Breton (1965).
[2] Soby (1949).
[3] Jean (1955).
[4] Marcel Jean (avec la collaboration de Arpad Mezei), Histoire de la peinture surréaliste, Seuil, Paris, 1959, pp.159-173.
[5] Matisse (1963).
[6] See Art News, November 2003, p.46.
[7] Wittrock (1976).
[8] Daniel Marchesseau, Yves Tanguy, Filipacchi, Paris, 1973.
[9] Waldberg (1977).
[10] Duhamel (1972).
[11] Mabin (1979).
[12] Rétrospective (1982).
[13] Schmidt (1982).
[14] Yves Tanguy: A Retrospective (exh.cat.), Solomon R. Guggenheim Museum, New York, 1983.
[15] Onslow-Ford (2002).
[16] Mundy (1983).
[17] Richet (1922).
[18] Nessen (1988).
[19] Morgane-Tanguy (1995).
[20] Tanguy (1993).
[21] Liliane Riou , Ma vie blanche et noire: Notes sur Yves Tanguy, La digitale, Quimperlé, 1996.
[22] Le Bihan (2001).
[23] Maur (2001).
[24] The middle-scale exhibition was held at Galerie Daniel Malingue, Paris. René le Bihan et al., Yves Tanguy (exh.cat.), Galerie Daniel Malingue, Paris, 15 mai-12 juillet 2002.
[25] Cariou (2007).
[26] Josick Mingam, Yves Tanguy surréaliste: “La conviction du jamais vu”: Essai psychanalytique, L’harmattan, Paris, 2007.
[27] Susan Davidson (ed.), Tanguy Calder: Between Surrealism and Abstraction (exh.cat.), L&M Arts, New York, 2010.
[28] Double Solitaire: The Surreal Worlds of Kay Sage and Yves Tanguy, Katonah Museum of Art, Katonah, The Mint Museum Charlotte, North Carolina, 2011.
[29] 『イヴ・タンギー版画展』佐谷画廊、一九八五年(Exhibition of Yves Tanguy’s Etchings (exh.cat.), Satani Gallery, 1985. The works exhibited then are now owned by Hyougo Prefecture Museum, Japan.
[30]Yves Tanguy 1900-1955』バウハウス(イヴ・タンギー美術館)、1991年(Yves Tanguy 1900-1955, Bauhaus [the Museum of Yves Tanguy], 1991. The works owned by the museum are found in Yves Tanguy, Christie’s, New York, 1999; An Important Private Collection of Works by Yves Tanguy, Christie’s, New York, 2001.
[31] For example, the text of Okada Takahiko below was published as the first prize essay of “Mizue’s 60th Anniversary art critic essay contest”: 岡田隆彦「はんらんするタマシイの邦 ―― イヴ・タンギーの難破譚1」『みづゑ』七三一号、一九六五年一二月、pp.78-83Okada Takahiko, “The Country of Overflowing Souls ―― A Shipwreck Story of Yves Tanguy, no.1,” in: Mizue, no.731, December 1965, pp.78-83; 「はんらんするタマシイの邦 ―― イヴ・タンギーの難破譚につき〈完〉」『みづゑ』七三二号、一九六六年一月、 pp.89-93.Okada Takahiko, “The Country of Overflowing Souls ―― A Shipwreck Story of Yves Tanguy (finish),” in: Mizue, no.732, January 1965, pp.89-93.
In addition, the text of Iwaya Kunio below is the most appropriate one as the Introduction of Tanguy in Japanese; 巖谷國士「イヴ・タンギーの歴史」『みづゑ』九二七号、美術出版社、一九八三年夏、pp.12-21Iwaya Kunio, The History of Yves Tanguy, in: Mizue, .no.927, Bijyutsu-syuppan-sya, Summer 1983, pp.12-21; reprinted in: Iwaya (1986).
[32] 「特集イヴ・タンギー=沈黙の原光景」『みづゑ』七九一号、美術出版社、一九七〇年一二月(”Special issue: Yves Tanguy = Silent Landscape of Origin,” Mizue, no.791, Bijyutu-syuppan-sya, December 1970;「イヴ・タンギー特集」『みづゑ』九二七号、美術出版社、一九八三年夏(”Special issue: Yves Tanguy, Mizue, no.927, Bijyutu-syuppan-sya, Summer 1983.
[33] Karin von Maur, “Yves Tanguy or ‘The Certainty of the Never-Seen’: Transitions in His Painterly Oeuvre,” in: Maur (2001), p.127.
[34] Mabin (1979), pp.73-74.
[35] Soby (1955), pp.20-21.
[36] Robert Lebel, “La morphologie conjuratoire de Tanguy,” in: Rétrospective (1982), pp.31-38.
[37] Iwaya (1986), p.52.
[38] Morgane-Tanguy (1995), pp.32-33.
[39] See Essays and Documents cited in Rétrospective (1982).
[40] Brion (1961), pp.171-184.
[41] 吉増剛造「イヴ・タンギー=海と宇宙と眼のない化石」『みづゑ』八三七号、美術出版社、一九七四年、p.64Yoshimasu Gouzou, “Yves Tanguy = Sea and Universe and Eyeless Fossils, Mizue, no,837, Bijyutsu-syuppan-sya, 1974, p.64.
[42] Okada (1985), p.170. About Mondrian’s remark, there is a short reference in the beginning of Nicolas Calas, “[Untitled],” in: Exhibition of Gouaches and Drawings by Yves Tanguy (exh.cat.), Pierre Matisse Gallery, New York, 1963, unpagenated.
In addition, according to Jimmy Ernst’s memory, Mondrian said this during a lunch with the exiled surrealists: Breton, Max and Jimmy Ernst, Duchamp, and Tanguy. Breton wanted Mondrian’s opinion about Surrealism and Duchamp asked Mondrian about Tanguy. Mondrian answered that Tanguy’s works are very beautiful but also very puzzling and “much too Abstract for me.” Breton asked him “Too abstract? For you?” Mondrian answerd Breton that his painting is concerned with reality and if Tanguy and he reach different destinations, they will still be on the same planet. Tanguy jumped up and embraced Mondrian, and said exaggeratedly “Ça, on faut accepter, cher maître tout à fait (That, dear Master, we must accept without qualification).” By this the situation was settled. Jimmy Ernst, A Not-So-Still-Life: A Memoir by Jimmy Ernst, St. Martin’s / Marek, New York, 1984, pp.227-228.