Guillaume Apollinaire, Correspondance avec les artistes, 1903-1918

This book presents the largely unpublished correspondence between Apollinaire and over one hundred artists, in France and from many other countries, active before and during the Great War. Including all the letters from artists received by Apollinaire and many of those he wrote, the book surveys a creative constellation which encompasses artists of every genre, some of them now largely forgotten, while others, young, unknown or widely ridiculed at the time, are now recognised as the inventors of fauvism, cubism, neo-primitivism and abstraction, as the precursors of surrealism, as the pioneers of heroic modernism. The wartime correspondence includes poignant and fraternal letters between Apollinaire and artists on the front-line, including Braque, Derain and Kisling. The book as a whole provides intimate access to artistic life in France, Europe and the United States between 1903 and 1918, while confirming Apollinaire's role as a clear-sighted critic and impresario, established at the centre of an extensive, international, shifting and diverse cultural community. The letters, transcribed in most cases from the original manuscripts. They are preceded by a general Introduction, accompanied by a presentation of each artist, by numerous precise and informative notes, by illustrations and a complete Index.