Brassai - Graffiti - 1960

THIS IS THE FIRST BEST-OF-PHOTOBOOKS AUCTION by 5Uhr30.com, starting in 2026.
With more than 100 great lots from my personal collection and from recent acquisitions.

SCARCE, SUPER BEAUTIFUL BOOK from 1960 (!) by legendary photographer Brassai, the "Eye of Paris (1899-1984), famous for "Paris de Nuit" (1933) - with the VERY SCARCE ORIGINAL DUSTJACKET.

BREATH-TAKING PHOTOGRAVURE PRINTING.

Showing Brassai's photographs of the graffiti carved and painted on the walls of Paris.

Photography in Paris during the interwar years was shaped by two significant avant-garde movements: Surrealism and New Vision. The relevant works of Man Ray, Brassaï, Florence Henri, André Kertész, and Germaine Krull have become synonymous with the city around 1930.
The term 'Avant-Garde' originally comes from French military language and refers to the vanguard, i.e., the unit that advances first and thus makes first contact with the enemy. The German military also originally referred to the vanguard as the avant-garde.

Here in the VERY SCARCE HARDCOVER VARIANT IN LINEN WITH THE ORIGINAL PHOTO-ILLUSTRATED DUSTJACKET (there were published different versions same time; one with photo-illustrated cover without jacket and one in paperback).

This is a lot by 5Uhr30.com (Ecki Heuser, Cologne, Germany).
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In the 1930s, Brassaï was interested in the marginal art form of graffiti, which he saw as a form of outsider art that could open the door to new forms of artistic expression. His atmospheric photographs capture the essence of this unbridled creativity. Strong black and white contrasts alternate with softer shades of gray, which merge into one another and soften the hard furrows typical of graffiti. Some of these photographs first appeared in the surrealist magazine Minotaure; others were first published in France and Germany in 1960, in a work entitled Graffiti, which accompanied an exhibition that was shown in New York, London, Milan, Baden-Baden, Frankfurt, Hanover and Paris. This approach was very influential, both for the Surrealists and for Outsider Art.

The term avant-garde is used when an artist takes an innovative and experimental approach to one aspect of their art. The avant-garde in photography takes a critical stance towards existing aesthetic views.
It is important to understand that avant-garde refers to an artistic movement that challenges existing aesthetic norms and seeks new forms of expression.

Christian Belser Verlag, Stuttgart, Berlin, Zurich. 1960. First German edition, first printing.

Photo-illustrated hardcover. 230 x 275 mm. 130 pages (13 pages with text). 105 black and white photos. Photos: Brassai. Translation from french into German: Karl Balser, Heidelberg. Text in German.

Condition:
Inside fresh and flawless and smoking-free; clean with no marks and with no foxing. Outside yellowed at the
spine, also partly on the covers. Dustjacket complete with no missing parts (also the flaps), but with trace of use; two tears at the bottom of the rear side (acid-free taped from behind), a bit rubbed and used at the edges (see pictures), with small (surface) paper loss at the left edge of the front cover. Overall fine, better than usual condition.

Wonderful early photobook by Brassai in excellent photogravure printing - very hard to find with the original dustjacket (here better than usual).