Izis (Israëlis Bidermanas), Jacques Prevert - Wenn es Frühling wird in Paris ("Grand Bal de printemps") - 1951

GENIOUS COOPERATION BETWEEN well-known Lithuanian-Jewish photographer Izis (photos)
and famous French author Jacques Prévert (text).
Very beautiful photo publication - in BREATH-TAKING PHOTOGRAVURE PRINTING.

Mentioned here:
Hans-Michael Koetzle, "Eyes on Paris. Paris im Fotobuch. 1890 bis heute" ("Paris in
Photobooks. 1890 until today"), pages 228-231.

Israëlis Bidermanas (1911-1980), who worked under the name of Izis, was a Lithuanian-Jewish photographer who worked in France and is best known for his photographs of French circuses and of Paris.
Izis was close friend with Jacques Prévert and became a major figure in the mid-century French movement of humanist photography - also exemplified by Brassaï, Cartier-Bresson, Doisneau, Sabine Weiss and Ronis - with "work that often displayed a wistfully poetic image of the city and its people."

Welcome to the auction by Anatole Desachy (France) and Ecki Heuser (Germany) in honor of Paris. To celebrate the 27th edition of „Paris Photo“, the biggest event for photography worldwide, we have gathered 27 photobooks about Paris, each.

IF YOU WIN MORE THAN 1 OF MY BOOKS IN THIS AUCTION, YOU WILL PAY ONLY 1 X SHIPPING COSTS -WORLDWIDE.

Kurt Desch, Munich, Vienna, Basel. 1951. First edition, first printing.

Paperback with dustjacket. 220 x 280 mm. 148 pages. 62 photos in black and white. Photos: Izis. Text: Jacques Prévert. Text in German.

Condition:
Inside fresh and flawless, clean with no marks and with no foxing; only at the rear side of the front cover and at the first blank page rest of a former tape. Dustjacket super fresh with small flaw at the spine and neat missing part at the bottom of the rear side; front flap also with rest of a former tape. Overall fine condition.

Great photobook by "Izis" about Paris.
Originally published by "Editions Clairefontaine, Lausanne" in the same year (19151) with same size, layout, content and cover.

"Izis, this ‘incorrigible loner’ (Saint-cyr), ‘astonished passer-by’ (Gautrand) and ‘discreet contemporary’ (Wanaverbecq), publicised his image of Paris three times in book form.
What all the titles - ‘Paris des Réves’ (1950), ‘Grand Bal de printemps’ (1951) and ‘Paris
des Poêtes’ (1977) - is the consistency with which an artist responsible for all work steps (photography, image selection, layout, text) was able to realise his ideas: author's books in the best sense of the word and - at least the first two - a model for quite a few publications of the 1950s and 6os. ‘Un livre doit être comme une chanson’, Izis himself had specified his attitude.
‘C'est le rhythme d'une promenade. I would like the reader to be able to continue his reading without being couped from one page to the next [...] I always use full-page or double-page photos, but never two photos, one on either side of the other, because this prevents the reader from turning to one photo. ‘Izis must have felt vindicated in his approach by the sensational success of ‘Paris des Reves’ - ‘a true best-seller’ and, with no fewer than sixteen editions and 170,000 copies sold, probably one of the best-selling photo books ever. The very next year saw the publication of
‘Grand Bal de printemps’ was published the following year, followed by a third contribution on Paris in 1977, whereby “Paris des Poetes” could be described as a book with a delay - an illustrated book whose delicate poetry was barely understood at the end of the 1970s. Neither the colour cover
colour cover or the few coloured double pages really offered anything new, according to Armelle Canitrot: ‘Ce qui était moderne en 1950 ne l'est plus. May 68 is passé par là.’
In contrast to the previous titles, ‘Paris des Poêtes’ was not a success. The latter had seemed contemporary, authentic and original, and they convincingly established what Izis called ‘photo-poème’. While the author had followed the model of a literary anthology for ‘Paris des Rêves’ (45 authors had been inspired by his pictures), ‘Grand Bal’ was the first successful collaboration with Jacques Prévert, who would also provide the texts for ‘Charmes de Londres’ the following year. ‘Nous étions faits pour travailler ensemble’, confirms the photographer, ’car c'était un poète qui s'inspirait d'une certaine rélalité; il trouvait dans mes photos les sujets qui lui tenaient à coeur, les amoureux, les enfants, ciel de Paris. Nous avions une vision proche.’ In fact, Prévert does not simply try to paraphrase or retell the photographer's pictorial inventions, but rather to sensitively add to them, to spin them out, to expand them. ‘Le texte offre en effet une caisse de résonance,’ Canitrot confirms, ’accentuue leur lecture poétique et politique en poétisant l'ironie et l'injustice qui émaillent la réalité quotidienne.’
In terms of format and layout, print quality and double-page concept with a text on the left and a sloping panel on the right, ‘Grand Bal’ follows the model tried and tested in ‘Paris des Rêves’. Izis, although a great admirer of Henri Cartier-Bresson, does not shy away from cropping his originally square pictures (taken with an Atoflex or Rolleiflex). Here he follows the motto: ‘The result justifies the means, you have to fight with the best weapons.’
Both titles, ‘Paris des Rêves’ and ‘Grand Bal de printemps’, were published by Clairefontaine and at the same time by the Guilde du Livre, which also operated from Lausanne and was the first French-language book club to attempt to open up the genre of the photo book to wider circles with titles such as ‘La Banlieue de Paris’ by Robert Doisneau (1949) and ‘La France de Profil’ by Paul Strand (1952). Compared to ‘Paris des Rêves’, however, Izis' second Paris volume was less cryptic in its conception and visual language, with hardly any confusion caused by reflections, vistas, reflections or haze, and instead a predominantly spring-like Paris with lots of light and long shadows. In terms of formal aesthetics, ‘Paris des Rêves’ certainly meets higher standards. In its conceptual approach, ‘Grand Bal’ operates at eye level."
(Hans-Michael Koetzle)

"Born in Marijampolė, present-day Lithuania, Bidermanas arrived in France in 1930 to become a painter. In 1933, he directed a photographic studio in the 13th Arrondissement of Paris. During World War II, being a Jew, he had to leave occupied Paris. He went to Ambazac, in the Limousin, where he adopted the pseudonym Izis and where he was arrested and tortured by the Nazis. He was freed by the French Resistance and became an underground fighter. At that time he photographed his companions, including Colonel Georges Guingouin. The poet and underground fighter Robert Giraud was the first to write about Izis in the weekly magazine Unir, a magazine created by the Resistance.
Upon the liberation of France at the end of World War II, Izis had a series of portraits of maquisards (rural resistance fighters who operated mainly in southern France) published to considerable acclaim. He returned to Paris where he became friends with French poet Jacques Prévert and other artists.
For his first book, Paris des rêves (Paris of Dreams), Izis asked writers and poets to contribute short texts to accompany his photographs, many of which showed Parisians and others apparently asleep or daydreaming. The book, which Izis designed, was a success. Izis joined Paris Match in 1950 and remained with it for twenty years, during which time he could choose his assignments.
Meanwhile, his books continued to be popular with the public. Among the numerous books by Izis, Gerry Badger and Martin Parr have especial praise for Le Cirque d'Izis (The Circus of Izis), "published in 1965, but bearing the stamp of an earlier era". Shot mostly in Paris but also in Lyon, Marseille and Toulon, the photographs are "affectionate and nostalgic, but also deeply melancholic" with "a desolate undercurrent", forming a work that is "profound, moving and extraordinary".
(Wikipedia)