Man Ray — Kunsthalle Basel, 1980

Original exhibition announcement card for Man Ray at Kunsthalle Basel, opening Saturday 19 January 1980, 18 Uhr, running through 24 February 1980. Kunsthalle Basel, Steinenberg 7. Printed card featuring Violon d'Ingres (1924) to recto and full exhibition, catalogue, and film-screening details to verso. 15 × 10.75 cm.

A strong piece of institutional ephemera from the secondary life of Surrealism. The front reproduces one of Man Ray's most recognisable images — the nude back with f-holes drawn in, the body as instrument — but the reverse is where the card becomes especially useful: opening details, a 210-page catalogue (162 black-and-white illustrations, 15 colour plates) with texts by R. Penrose, G. Metken, Man Ray, G. Bussmann, J.-Ch. Ammann, and H. Molderings, and a film programme including Retour à la raison (1923), Emak Bakia (1926), L'Étoile de mer (1927), and Mystère du château du dé (1928).

It reads not just as an invitation but as a compact institutional script for how Man Ray was being framed in German-speaking Europe at the start of the 1980s — part of the wider 1978–1980 touring exhibition Man Ray: Inventionen und Interpretationen. Seen now, the card sits somewhere between postcard, checklist, and museum prompt: the familiar Surrealist image on one side, the machinery of exhibition-making on the other.

Condition: Very good; light handling wear, faint surface marks, and minor age toning consistent with age and storage.
Shipping: Ships flat in a protective sleeve with backing board.