"In art, as well as in life, everything is possible, if there is love in it"
CHAGALL, Marc (illustrator); Gaston BACHELARD (introduction). Dessins pour la bible. Verve. Vol X, Nos 37 et 38. Paris: Editions de la Revue Verve. 1960.
Folio. Blue and white pictorial boards; pp. [4], xiii, 95, 96, [16], black and white Chagall reproductions, 24 full page colour lithographs; very minor rubbing to spine ends; otherwise near fine.
First Edition. This scarce double issue of Verve includes the drawings that Marc Chagall made in 1958-59 on biblical themes that had not been explored in his first illustration of the Bible (etched and reproduced in 33.34 of Verve).
As Bachelard writes in his Introduction to Dessins pour la bible, "Chagall reads the Bible, and, immediately, his reading is a light".
Iconic Russian artist, Marc Chagall, is credited with the creation of some of the most powerful examples of colour lithography as well as one of the principal artistic interpreters of The Bible. His oeuvre was also as varied in outlet as painting, the production of artist books and stained glass, including that of the United Nations building in New York City. His obsession with the Biblical world was complemented by his relationship with Ambroise Vollard, the legendary French art dealer, who can be accredited for promoting the promise and legacy of artists such as Paul Cezanne and Pablo Picasso, and who originally commissioned Chagall to create a sequence of etchings based predominantly on The Old Testament. Following this commission, Chagall made a seminal journey to Palestine in 1931 and he would emphasize his desire to portray the beauty he felt of the ancient text; "I have always believed it is the greastest source of poetry of all time".
The journey of this commission would be an all enduring one and yet painfully stalled by life-threatening incidents such as the Nazi Party's campaign against "degenerate" modern art, specifically by Jewish artists, which placed Chagall in grave danger. 25 years after Vollard's original commission, Chagall returned to his famous The Bible Series, which he started in 1931-1939, subsequent to his inspired trip to The Holy Land, and resumed in 1952-56. The first series of The Bible Series comprised two volumes and 105 etchings. This second series of Drawings for the Bible is comprised of 24 color lithographs, illustrating tales from the Bible, that was published by the French art magazine Verve.
In the foreword to the first catalogue of The National Museum of the Biblical Message in Nice, Chagall writes of his hope that his depictions of the Bible could move those of any religion, "Can this dream be realized? In art, as well as in life, everything is possible, if there is love in it".
Verve, the modernist Parisian art magazine at the forefront of encapsulating the radical creative aesthetic of its time, was first published in 1937 with famous cover artwork by Henri Matisse. Subsequently, it was responsible for showcasing the most distinguished characters of the Parisian art scene of the 20th century, including textual contributions by prominent transgressive authors such as James Joyce.
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