[ARTIST'S BOOK]. SHAKESPEARE, William (1564-1616). Roméo et Juliette, Prétexte a Mise en Scène par Jean Cocteau, d’après le Drame de William Shakespeare. Décors et Costumes de Jean Hugo. Paris: Au Sans Pareil, 1926.

4to. 12 woodcuts and 7 headpieces with hand-coloring, woodcut title vignette after Jean Hugo. Blue crushed levant with quadruple rule border, spine in 6 compartments with 5 raised bands gilt, top edge gilt, others uncut, wide turn-ins gilt, STAMP-SIGNED BY VERMOREL; original wrappers bound in.

LIMITED EDITION, number 131 of 350 copies on Montgolfier d'Annonay of a total edition of 420 copies. Jean Hugo, a member of the French Surrealist movement of the 1920s, "was a part of the revolution in theater, poetry, music and dance after World War I” (John Andrew Frey). Cocteau's Roméo et Juliette, which debuted at the Soirees de Paris du Comte Etienne de Beaumont at the Theater de la Cigale in Paris on June 2, 1924, was not strictly a ballet, was the first of of his “textes-prétextes,” a form of play which he hoped would save the French theater. “Hugo designed a set [for Cocteau's play] whose hangings and floor would be of black cloth with colored linear decorations, and for the actors black tights and black velvet dresses, doublets and short hose, painted with ‘embroidery’ that would be picked out by lighting… [Cocteau recalled that the] ‘Red lights framing the stage kept the audience from seeing anything else” (Steegmuller p.328).

Property from the Collection of Warren Ehrlich

This lot is located in Chicago.

[ARTIST'S BOOK]. SHAKESPEARE, William (1564-1616). Roméo et Juliette, Prétexte a Mise en Scène par Jean Cocteau, d’après le Drame de William Shakespeare. Décors et Costumes de Jean Hugo. Paris: Au Sans Pareil, 1926.