Heading: (Léger, Fernand, artist)
Author: Cendrars, Blaise
Title: La Fin du Monde filmée par l'Ange N.-D.
Place Published: Paris
Publisher:Editions de la Siréne
Date Published: 1919
Description: [58] pp. 22 pochoir illustrations by Fernand Léger half-title, title, chapter titles, and colophon. (4to) 31.8x25.4 cm (12½x10") original printed wrappers, glassine. Number 927 of 1200 copies on Velin Lafuma from a total edition of 1225.Among the most important pochoir-illustrated books of the 20th century. "...La Fin du Monde, filmée par l'ange N.-D., was originally composed as a film script in 1916 and shows a firsthand awareness of the movies...This collaboration with Fernand Léger was issued in 1919 by éditions de la Sirène, owned by Jean Cocteau. In this farce of the Last Judgement, God runs a circus sideshow on Mars, starring biblical characters. Léger's illustrations are closely related to the story. His double-page chapter headings and other illustrations are a landmark of modern book design and build on the collage technique of Cubism, the literary calligrams of Apollinaire, and the cinematic inventions of Abel Gance. The line-block reproductions of drawings are colored with pochoir. In a letter to Kahnweiler dated 11 December, 1919, Léger explained his inspiration: 'Every age brings some new elements which should serve us; the great difficulty is to translate them into plastic terms.'" - Donna Stein, p. 22 in Artist's Books in the Modern Era 1870-2000. From Manet to Hockney, 54; A Century of Artists Books, p. 170.

Chipping to glassine; light wear to wrappers with bump at lower corner also affecting textblock, wrappers coming un-glued at bit at head of gutter; very good or better.