Illustration to Une Semaine de Bonté - Max Ernst

A surrealist collage plate from Max Ernst's 1934 graphic novel, Une Semaine de Bonté, featuring a hybrid lion-man figure and a woman in a dream-like scene.

This work is a plate from the 1934 graphic novel Une Semaine de Bonté, or A Week of Kindness, by the German Surrealist Max Ernst. Ernst created this series by cutting and reassembling Victorian-era wood engravings, a technique he used to subvert the original context of 19th-century illustrations. By isolating figures and objects from their source material and placing them into new, illogical arrangements, he generated a dream-like narrative that defies conventional interpretation.

The image features a hybrid figure, part man and part lion, holding a blade while connected by a heavy chain to a female figure standing against a stone wall. The stark, monochromatic aesthetic of the original woodcut is preserved, with the cross-hatching and line work typical of Victorian commercial printing. Ernst used these found images to construct a world where the mundane becomes uncanny. The juxtaposition of the domestic setting with the monstrous, anthropomorphic character creates a sense of unease. This work reflects the Surrealist interest in the unconscious mind, where the boundaries between reality and fantasy are blurred. The collage process itself acts as a method of disruption, forcing the viewer to confront the absurdity of the scene. As a piece of Surrealist history, this print offers a glimpse into the methods Ernst employed to challenge the viewer's perception of narrative and visual logic. The composition relies on the tension between the two figures, linked by the physical weight of the chain, which anchors the scene in a space that feels both claustrophobic and impossible.