André Breton’s Nadja rehabilitated as a “heroine” in Rouen
She left a name as a character in literature, but she was much more: Nadja, who gave her title to a famous book by the surrealist André Breton, is rehabilitated as a “heroine” in an exhibition in Rouen.
Nadja, a surrealist itinerary will take place until November 6 at the Museum of Fine Arts with the aim of making the young woman better known behind the story of 1928, the most famous work in the literature of this current.
Why Rouen? Because the book “was written two-thirds in Normandy”, in August 1927, in Varengeville-sur-Mer (Seine-Maritime), underlines Florence Calame-Levert, exhibition curator. And the museums of Rouen are devoting a season to other “heroines”, including the artists Sheila Hicks and Nina Childress.
It was in Paris that the relationship was forged, in October 1926, between the 30-year-old poet and the young woman of 24. He approached her in the street. They start talking, which they do for ten days.
Nadja (Gallimard editions), which tells it, is a book full of mysteries which attracts curiosity by its sometimes cold, sometimes enigmatic style, and by the photos and reproductions of works that accompany it. Ten drawings are signed by Nadja herself, including originals shown in this exhibition in Rouen.
“oblique” personality
His real name has long been lost. André Breton, remembering a “Hélène D.”, has forgotten her or pretends to forget her.
He was found by a researcher, Georges Sebbag, and his biography was written in 2009 by a novelist, Hester Albach (Léona, heroine of surrealism).
When she meets André Breton, Léona Delcourt, a native of Saint-André-lez-Lille, who became a mother at 17, moved to Paris hoping to break into fashion, lives by expedients and always nourishes creative dreams.
“She has an extremely strong personality, a little oblique, which means that he is defined by her”, emphasizes Alexandre Mare, another curator of the exhibition.
But, he adds, “she is not completely fooled by the unequal relationship” between her and the leader of an avant-garde movement, a follower of scandal, a wise collector, married.
Despite the success of the book in which her drawings appear, Nadja will not be recognized as a co-author. The famous cover of the paperback edition (Folio), a self-portrait where her face emerges from a glove, is by her.
“Convulsion of Madness”
André Breton will help him financially. “To support himself, he sells a painting by Georges Braque. He did not live from his poetry but from an activity as a courtier in art, buying and reselling paintings, ”says the director of the Rouen museum Sylvain Amic.
Above all, the poet will encourage the young woman to draw and write. From it are born dozens of fiery letters, spread out here under a window.
There is a terribly prophetic aspect to Nadja’s last sentence, which speaks of “convulsive” beauty. “André Breton and Léona Delcourt have very different destinies. Convulsive, for her, it’s the convulsion of illness, of madness”, notes the curator.
From March 1927, the young woman was interned in psychiatry. She would not leave until her death in 1941, at the age of 38.
An inventory of her personal effects when she entered the hospital, recently found in the Archives of Paris and exhibited for the first time, ends with the mention: “1 single glove”, like the one she had designed.
Hugues HONORÉ/AFP
She left a name as a literary character, but she was much more: Nadja, who gave her title to a famous book by the surrealist André Breton, is rehabilitated as a “heroine” in an exhibition in Rouen. Nadja, a surrealist itinerary will take place until November 6 at the Museum of Fine Arts with the aim of raising awareness of…