Max Ernst in 1929: Collage and the Politics of the Outmoded

Abstract

In 1929, Max Ernst returned to collage with La Femme 100 têtes, a cycle of 147 collages with brief captions. Although collage had been central to Ernst's early work, he shifted to frottage after the 1924 Surrealist Manifesto. This paper explores Ernst’s return to collage amid a critical moment of division within the surrealist movement, polarized by debates over surrealism's revolutionary role, collective creativity, and its relationship to political action. In this context, La Femme 100 têtes exemplifies how collage, with its use of ambiguity and refashioning of outdated materials, navigated the cultural and political impasse surrealism faced. The work challenged the modernist avant-garde’s aesthetic project, adopting a position beyond art but before politics. However, collage’s subversive potential was ultimately absorbed into art history as a new cultural form.