Fernand Divoire 14274, Henri-Martin Barzun 1090026 — ART ET ACTION - Le simultané EST (incipit)

Art et Action, 1923, 1e druk, Originele lichtblauwe kartonnen omslag met gedrukt Art et Action-monogram op het voorplat; genaaid door twee perforaties met koord, 20, A very interesting programme/manifesto of the experimental Paris theatre laboratory ‘Art et Action’, founded and directed by Édouard Autant and Louise Lara, documenting its radical experiments with simultaneous poetry, polyphonic recitation and the visual and spatial transformation of the stage. No conventional title-page or imprint. Booklet containing: Fernand Divoire's manifesto “Le simultané EST”, followed by his ‘Étude sur le décor et la mise en scène des œuvres polyphoniques et simultanées’. Further sections document Art et Action's experiments with Stéphane Mallarmé's ‘Un Coup de dés jamais n'abolira le hasard’, including “Polyphonie (Mallarmé)” and the diagrammatic ‘Livret de polyphonie. Le Coup de dés de Stéphane Mallarmé’, and Henri-Martin Barzun's theories and experiments in simultaneous and orchestral poetry. Scenographic figures reproduce experimental stage designs, architectural constructions and diagrams devised to translate polyphonic recitation into spatial, visual and kinetic form. Some are dated 1922, one signed André Véra. ‘Art et Action’ presented Barzun's ‘Panharmonie orphique, drame simultané’ in Paris in December 1922, while Divoire presented ‘Le simultané EST’ before the ‘Art et Action’ audience in 1923. The present booklet therefore appears to belong to this exceptionally fertile moment in the laboratory's development and may have served both as a theoretical statement and as documentation of recent experimental productions. A fascinating testimony to the French theatrical avant-garde, situated at the intersection of Simultaneism, visual poetry, experimental typography, scenography and performance., Goed