Little Anatomy of the Physical Unconscious, or the Anatomy of the Image (Belle reliure)

In the 1950s Hans Bellmer composed a small book in which he elucidated upon the psychosexual forces that provided the impetus for his artistic works. He described the project as "a kind of little anatomy of the (physical) unconscious with text and drawings. But it will also be a rather ‘dry’ work, by which I mean something tending to be exceedingly objective and avoiding, in the interests of clarity, whims of a verbal nature. It is the natural sequel to the experiments with the Doll, but should therefore encompass everything that Surrealism has brought to light. … But there is also a certain necessity in setting down this story, a necessity that is even quite enthralling."

In 1957 the original French edition appeared of Bellmer’s Little Anatomy of the Physical Unconscious, or the Anatomy of the Image, with ten original illustrations by the artist. The book met with a positive reception from poets and literary figures such as André Breton and Jöe Bousquet, as well as a number of psychologists. Particularly impressed by the selection of poetic anagrams in the book, Man Ray telegrammed Bellmer the following anagram in response: "IMAGE = MAGIE" (Image = Magic). Although Bellmer may have striven to take an almost clinical "scientific" approach to his analysis of the physical unconscious, the work is nevertheless informed by a hyperdriven sensual awareness and a distinctly "magical" view of life.

This is the first translation of Bellmer’s text to appear in English. After nearly half a century, a new audience of readers can experience his illumination of the "purely subjective" subconscious realm of our bodies which "finds nourishment in feverish, often psycho-pathological states, including that of sexual desire."

Bellmer was born in Katowice, Poland, to a middle-class family. As a young man he was arrested in 1922 for exhibiting artwork that "undermined the moral supports of the state." In 1923 he moved to Berlin where, under the influence of George Grosz and others, he further developed the formidable skills in draftsmanship that underlie all his later graphic work. In 1933 Bellmer abandoned his established career as a publicity artist and cultivated an increasingly obsessive relationship with the remarkable dolls he had begun to fabricate (inspired by the discovery of a box of childhood toys) and photograph. In 1938 Bellmer relocated to Paris. The following year he was arrested -- along with Max Ernst -- and sent to an internment camp for German nationals, but released after a number of months. In 1941 he threw his passport down a sewer drain. Bellmer spent the remainder of his life in France, often in difficult circumstances. He died in Paris in 1975, and is buried next to Unica Zürn in the Père Lachaise Cemetery.

Bellmer’s friendships with literary figures such as Jöe Bousquet, Paul Eluard, and Georges Bataille resulted in a number of collaborations and illustrated books. His personal relations with women were often fraught with tragedy: his first wife, Margarete, died from tuberculosis; his second marriage ended in divorce; his lover and associate Nora Mitrani died before she could complete a biography of Bellmer entitled Rose au coeur violet (Rose with a Violet Heart); and his later collaborator and lover, the poet Unica Zürn, committed suicide by jumping from the window of his apartment after a protracted struggle with schizophrenia.

Bellmer’s diverse artistic output ranged from sculpture and objets provocateur, to drawings, gouaches, engravings, and photographs. In the decades since they were conceived, these explicit creations have lost none of their power—in fact, they have only become more controversial.