The inventor of the word “Surrealism” was Charentais

Surrealism is 100 years old today. On October 15, 1924, the first “Surrealist Manifesto” was published by André Breton, giving birth to a revolutionary artistic movement, inspired by dreams and the unconscious. What is less known is that the word “Surrealism” was “invented” by a Charentais, Pierre Albert-Birot from Angoumois (1876-1967). Poet, painter, sculptor, designer, he spent his entire career in Paris, in the wake of the Surrealists, without claiming to be a Surrealist himself. He was close to Guillaume Apollinaire, with whom he wrote the play “Les Mamelles de Tirésias” in 1917, and it was on this occasion that the word “Surrealism” was born.

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The Angoulême Museum today preserves a collection of around 300 works by Pierre Albert-Birot, paintings, sculptures, texts, drawings, donated by his wife Arlette before her death in 2010. Others are preserved at the Pompidou Center in Paris. In 2013, the Angoulême Museum hosted an exhibition dedicated to the Angoumois artist. A street bears his name in Angoulême.

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