36-Year Run Of Derrière Le Miroir

At the end of World War II in 1945, avid art dealer and collector Aimé Maeght (“mahg”) opened his art gallery in Paris, a time when a number of exiled artists were able to return to France. A year later in 1946 Maeght published his first issue of Derrière le Miroir, or Behind the Mirror, what would go on to be a monolithic exposition of the work of many influential modern artists, lasting 36 years up until just following his death, the final issue being published in 1982. Derrière le Miroir was a popular art and writing magazine amongst the French public, and provided a valuable connection between the exciting and innovative work being created by these artists and the everyday viewers and culture appreciators of their society.

Artists like Matisse, Miró, Calder, Chagall, Braque, Giacometti, Kandinsky and Léger alongside writers and poets such as Balthazar and André Breton were offered full issues of space to make their mark, embracing the printing and publishing opportunity with entire suites of new unique material. Maeght had it stone lithograph printed at a luxurious 11-by-15 inches and in any number of colors that the artist was inspired by, often showing highly interesting standout pigments done with multiple passes— affording these creators a chance to reproduce, distribute and display high quality versions of their artwork into the hands of anybody interested. The resulting collection of the publication of 36 years of artists’ distinctive pieces is a radiant and visionary historical retrospective, allocating a space for some exceptional and inventive creations that exist nowhere else.

Mostly printed in editions of only 150, the pages from this publication are highly sought after as they represent a fleeting moment amidst a popular artist’s career in which their minds were given free reign to express something new and uninhibited while exemplary of their personal artistic identity.