Wolfgang Paalen

Wolfgang Paalen (1905–1958) was an Austrian-born painter, sculptor, and theorist associated with Surrealism, whose practice moved restlessly between European modernism, pre-Columbian culture, Indigenous Northwest Coast art, and a speculative cosmological abstraction he termed Dynaton.

After early involvement with the Surrealist movement in Paris and participation in the 1938 Exposition Internationale du Surréalisme, Paalen emigrated to Mexico in 1939, where he founded the influential journal DYN (1942–1944), which anticipated many concerns of Abstract Expressionism and opened dialogue between European avant-garde thought and the Americas. His writing and painting consistently sought a synthesis of art, science, and anthropology — a modernism oriented toward the future rather than the unconscious.

Paalen’s final years in Mexico were marked by increasing isolation and a return to large-scale painting. He died in 1958. A posthumous retrospective was organised in Paris in 1960 at Librairie Loliée, accompanied by a text by Octavio Paz.

This collection brings together exhibition ephemera, printed matter, and documents connected to Paalen’s practice and posthumous reception.

  • Original 1960 Wolfgang Paalen exhibition insert 'En Hommage', Librairie Loliée, Paris, recto showing the title in quotation marks, artist name PAALEN Wolfgang with dates 1905–1958, a list of three loaned works — Personnages dans une grotte 1933, Selam Trilogy 1947, Sans titre 1954 — lender credit to Mme Géo Dupin, and a note identifying the sheet as an extract from a contemporary article on the retrospective. Reverse of 1960 Wolfgang Paalen 'En Hommage' insert showing an elegiac French text by Octavio Paz, dated Paris, 5 novembre 1960, describing Paalen's practice as suspended between extremes, moving between poetry, science, pre-Columbian culture, and abstraction, closing with the phrase 'Espace sans rivages'.

    Wolfgang Paalen — “En Hommage” / Octavio Paz Text Insert, Librairie Loliée, Paris, 1960

    Wolfgang Paalen — “En Hommage” / Octavio Paz Text Insert, Librairie Loliée, Paris, 1960