Eileen Agar ─ Dreaming Oneself Awake

Born in Buenos Aires in 1899 but largely working and living in Britain and Europe, Eileen Agar was an artist who throughout her long career synthesized elements of the two main artistic movements of the twentieth-century: cubism and surrealism. In this first full account of Agar’s complete works—which include paintings, collages, photographs, and objects—Michel Remy offers a rich exploration of an important artist who was deeply entrenched in some of the most innovative scenes of the twentieth-century art world.

Drawing on archival research as well as personal conversations with Agar, Remy examines her life and work throughout her 80-year-career, including her passage through cubism and abstraction and into surrealism and her sustained participation in surrealist activities in England and abroad. He illustrates each of her periods with striking images of works and rare photographs of her life, revealing the powerful myth-making drive that compelled her. He also explores the tenderness, humor, poetry, love of nature and the world, subversion of the laws of reality, and celebration of femininity that were her essential qualities and subjects. The result is a fresh and cogent account of a fascinating artist whose quality of work, independence of mind, and freedom of imagination demonstrate the powerful role that women artists played in the story of surrealism.

Michel Remy is professor emeritus of English literature and art history at the University of Nice. He has published many books, including The Surrealist World of Desmond Morris, Surrealism in Britain, and On the Thirteenth Stroke of Midnight.