Le violon d’Ingres

Inscription: Signed and dated (lower right): Man / Ray / 1924

Marking: Stamped (verso of the flush mount, in red ink): ORIGINAL

the artist (1924–62; sold in 1962 to Jacobs); Rosalind Gersten Jacobs and Melvin Jacobs, New York (1962–his d. 1993); Rosalind Gersten Jacobs, New York (1993–d. 2019; their sale, Christie’s, New York, May 14, 2022, no. 615, sold to Bluff); Bluff Collection (from 2022)

Paris. Bibliotheque Nationale. "Man Ray: Exposition de l'oeuvre photographique," 1962, no. 24 (as "Violon d'Ingres").

Museum of Modern Art, New York. "Dada, Surrealism, and Their Heritage," March 27–June 9, 1968, no. 189 (as "Le Violon d'Ingres," 1921, lent by Mr. and Mrs. Melvin Jacobs, New York).

Los Angeles County Museum of Art. "Dada, Surrealism, and Their Heritage," July 16–September 8, 1968, no. 189.

Art Institute of Chicago. "Dada, Surrealism, and Their Heritage," October 19–December 8, 1968, no. 189.

New York. Cordier & Ekstrom, inc. "Man Ray: A Selection of Paintings," January 14–February 7, 1970, unnumbered cat. (as "Le Violon d'Ingres," lent by Mr. and Mrs. Melvin Jacobs, New York).

Rotterdam. Museum Boymans-van Beuningen. "Man Ray," September 24–November 7, 1971, no. 254 (lent by Melvin Jacobs, New York).

Paris. Musée National d'Art Moderne. "Man Ray," January 7–February 28, 1972, no. 254 (lent by M. and Mme Melvin Jacobs, New York).

Humlebæk. Louisiana Museum of Modern Art. "Man Ray," March 18–May 7, 1972, no. 235 (lent by Melvin Jacobs, New York).

New York Cultural Center. "Man Ray: Inventor/Painter/Poet," December 19, 1974–March 2, 1975, no. 201 (as "Violin d'Ingres," lent by Mr. and Mrs. Melvin Jacobs, Key Biscayne, Florida).

London. Institute of Contemporary Arts. "Man Ray," April 11–June 1, 1975, no. 186 (as "Violin d'Ingres," lent by Rosalind and Melvin Jacobs, Key Biscayne, Florida).

New York. Whitney Museum of American Art, Downtown Branch. "Dada and New York," May 31–July 6, 1979, not in catalogue.

Musée National d'Art Moderne, Centre Georges Pompidou. "Atelier Man Ray: Berenice Abbott, Jacques-André Boiffard, Bill Brandt, Lee Miller, 1920–1935," December 2, 1982–January 23, 1983.

Washington, D.C. National Museum of American Art, Smithsonian Institution. "Perpetual Motif: The Art of Man Ray," December 2, 1988–February 20, 1989, unnumbered cat. (fig. 262; as "Le Violon d'Ingres").

Los Angeles. Museum of Contemporary Art. "Perpetual Motif: The Art of Man Ray," March 17–May 28, 1989, unnumbered cat.

Houston. Menil Collection. "Perpetual Motif: The Art of Man Ray," June 30–September 17, 1989, unnumbered cat.

London. Royal Academy of Arts. "The Art of Photography 1839–1989," September 23–December 23, 1989, no. 246 (as "Le Violon d'Ingres," lent by Mr. and Mrs. Melvin Jacobs).

Philadelphia Museum of Art. "Perpetual Motif: The Art of Man Ray," October 14, 1989–January 7, 1990, unnumbered cat.

Washington, D.C. Phillips Collection. "Americans in Paris: Man Ray, Gerald Murphy, Stuart Davis, Alexander Calder," April 27–August 18, 1996, unnumbered cat. (p. 92; as "Le Violon d'Ingres," lent by Mrs. Melvin Jacobs, New York).

New York. André Emmerich Gallery. "Man Ray: An American Surrealist Vision," November 6–December 20, 1997, unnum. brochure (back cover; checklist no. 74; as "Violon d'Ingres").

Miami. Museum of Contemporary Art. "Sweet Dreams and Nightmares: Dada and Surrealism from the Rosalind and Melvin Jacobs Collection," March 31–May 28, 2000, unnumbered cat. (p. 44; as "Le Violon d'Ingres").

New York. Zabriskie Gallery. "Kiki of Montparnasse," April 9–May 24, 2002, no. 23 (as "Le Violon d'Ingres," lent by Mrs. Rosalind Jacobs).

New York. Pace/MacGill Gallery. "The Long Arm of Coincidence: Selections from the Rosalind and Melvin Jacobs Collection," April 2–May 2, 2009, unnumbered cat. (as "Le Violon d'Ingres").

New York. Museum of Modern Art. "The Original Copy: Photography of Sculpture, 1839 to Today," August 1–November 1, 2010, unnumbered cat. (pl. 217; as "Le Violon d'Ingres," lent by Rosalind and Melvin Jacobs).

Eugene. Jordan Schnitzer Museum of Art, University of Oregon. August 17–November 10, 2022.

Littérature no. 13 (June 1924), ill. frontispiece (Centre Pompidou, Paris edition), calls it "Le Violon d'Ingres".

Man Ray. Self Portrait. Boston, 1963, p. 158, ill. (unknown edition), calls it "Violon d'Ingres".

Renilde Hammacher-van den Brande and Liesbeth Brandt Corstius. Man Ray. Exh. cat., Museum Boymans-van Beuningen. [Rotterdam], [1971], pp. 18, 114, 166, no. 254, ill. p. 108.

Lara Vinca Masini. Man Ray. Florence, 1974, p. 26, fig. 47 (Galleria Il Fauno, Turin edition), calls it "Violon d'Ingres" in the text and "Le Violon d'Ingres" in the caption.

Roland Penrose. Man Ray. Boston, 1975, pp. 92, 182, 185, fig. 47 (Galleria Il Fauno, Turin edition), calls it "Violon d'Ingres".

Robert Pincus-Witten. "Man Ray: The Homonymic Pun and American Vernacular." Artforum 13 (April 1975), p. 58, ill. p. 57 (unknown edition), calls it "Violon d'Ingres".

Mario Amaya and Lee Miller Penrose. "My Man Ray: Interview with Lee Miller Penrose." Art in America 63 (May–June 1975), p. 60.

Alden Whitman. "Man Ray Is Dead in Paris at 86; Dadaist Painter and Photographer." New York Times (November 19, 1976), p. A24, ill., calls it "Violin d'Ingres".

Arturo Schwarz. Man Ray: The Rigour of Imagination. New York, 1977, pp. 281–82, 372, fig. 415.

Janus. Man Ray: L'Immagine Fotografica. Venice, 1977, p. 189, no. 42, ill. and ill. p. 58 (not this edition).

Dawn Ades. Dada and Surrealism Reviewed. Exh. cat., Hayward Gallery. [London], 1978, p. 178, no. 8.24, ill. p. 170 (edition in Ref. Littérature 1924).

Jean-Hubert Martin in Man Ray: Photographe. Exh. cat., Musée national d'art moderne, Centre national d'art et de culture Georges Pompidou. Paris, 1981, pp. 7–8, calls it "Le Violon d'Ingres".

Herbert Molderings in Man Ray: Photographe. Exh. cat., Musée national d'art moderne, Centre national d'art et de culture Georges Pompidou. Paris, 1981, pp. 15–16, no. 4, ill. p. 17 (unknown edition).

Edouard Jaguer. Les Mystères de la Chambre Noire: le surréalisme et la photographie. Paris, 1982, ill. front cover.

Arturo Schwarz. Man Ray, Carte Varie e Variabili. Exh. cat., Padiglione d'Arte Contemporanea. Milan, 1983, p. 27.

Dawn Ades in In the Mind's Eye: Dada and Surrealism. Ed. Terry Ann R. Neff. Exh. cat., Museum of Contemporary Art, Chicago. New York, 1984, p. 31, calls it "Ingres's Violin".

Merry Foresta in Perpetual Motif: The Art of Man Ray. Exh. cat., National Museum of American Art, Smithsonian Institution, Washington, D. C. New York, 1988, p. 293.

Billy Klüver and Julie Martin in Perpetual Motif: The Art of Man Ray. Exh. cat., National Museum of American Art, Smithsonian Institution, Washington, D. C. New York, 1988, p. 125.

Sandra S. Phillips in Perpetual Motif: The Art of Man Ray. Exh. cat., National Museum of American Art, Smithsonian Institution, Washington, D. C. New York, 1988, pp. 193, 212.

Roger Shattuck in Perpetual Motif: The Art of Man Ray. Exh. cat., National Museum of American Art, Smithsonian Institution, Washington, D. C. New York, 1988, p. 318, fig. 262.

Neil Baldwin. Man Ray: American Artist. New York, 1988, pp. 110–11, 364, ill. pp. 104 (Naomi and David Savage edition), 361 (installation photo, La rue Férou studio, March 1983).

Billy Klüver and Julie Martin. Kiki's Paris: Artists and Lovers 1900–1930. New York, 1989, pp. 134, 231 n. 1, fig. 1, call it "Le Violon d'Ingres".

Francis M. Naumann. Man Ray. Exh. brochure, Andre Emmerich Gallery. New York, [1997], unpaginated, ill. back cover.

Katherine Ware. "Plates." Man Ray: Photographs from the J. Paul Getty Museum. Los Angeles, 1998, pp. 40, 60, 140 pl. 17.

Katherine Ware. A Practical Dreamer: The Photographs of Man Ray. Exh. cat., J. Paul Getty Museum. Los Angeles, 1998, unpaginated, ill.

Jo Ann Callis et al. "A Labyrinth of Media: The Photographs of Man Ray." Man Ray: Photographs from the J. Paul Getty Museum. Los Angeles, 1998, pp. 115–16, 120, 133, call it "Violon d'Ingres".

David Joselit. Infinite Regress: Marchel Duchamp 1910–1941. Cambridge, Mass., 1998, pp. 34, 45, 47, fig. 1.16 (unknown edition), calls it "Violon d'Ingres" in text and "Le Violon d'Ingres" in image caption.

Bonnie Clearwater. Sweet Dreams and Nightmares: Dada and Surrealism from the Rosalind and Melvin Jacobs Collection. Exh. cat., Museum of Contemporary Art. Miami, 2000, pp. 4, 7–8, 44, ill. front cover, frontispiece (color), fig. 5 (reproduced on a 1973 poster).

Kirsten Hoving Powell. "'Le Violon d'Ingres': Man Ray's Variations on Ingres, Deformation, Desire and de Sade." Art History 23 (December 2000), pp. 772–74, 780, 783, 797, pl. 59 (J. Paul Getty Museum, Los Angeles edition), calls it "Le Violon d'Ingres".

Herbert R. Lottman. Man Ray's Montparnasse. New York, 2001, pp. 78–79, ill. (unknown edition), calls it "Le Violon d'Ingres".

Alexandre Castant. Noire et blanche de Man Ray. Paris, 2003, p. 7, ill. p. 6 (unknown edition), calls it "Le Violon d'Ingres".

David Bate. Photography and Surrealism: Sexuality, Colonialism and Social Dissent. London, 2003, pp. 28–29, 42, 68–69, 113–27, 135–44, fig. 22, ill. frontispiece (unknown edition), calls it "Le Violon d'Ingres".

Wendy Grossman. "Man Ray's Endgame and Other Modernist Gambits." The Art of the Project: Projects and Experiments in Modern French Culture. Ed. Johnnie Gratton and Michael Sheringham. New York, 2005, pp. 42–43, calls it "Violin d'Ingres".

Wendy A. Grossman and Steven Manford. "Unmasking Man Ray's 'Noire et blanche'." American Art 20, no. 2 (Summer 2006), p. 136, call it "Violon d'Ingres".

Katie Croll-Knight in Duchamp, Man Ray, Picabia. Ed. Jennifer Mundy. Exh. cat., Tate Modern. London, 2008, pp. 192, 195.

Jennifer Mundy in Duchamp, Man Ray, Picabia. Ed. Jennifer Mundy. Exh. cat., Tate Modern. London, 2008, p. 47, calls it "Le Violon d'Ingres".

Mason Klein in Mason Klein. Alias Man Ray: The Art of Reinvention. Exh. cat., Jewish Museum, New York. New Haven, 2009, pp. 82, 87–88, 90, 92, 217 n. 109, fig. 84.

Wendy Grossman in The Long Arm of Coincidence: Selections from the Rosalind and Melvin Jacobs Collection. Exh. cat., Pace/MacGill Gallery, New York. Göttingen, 2009, unpaginated, pl. 24.

Francis M. Naumann in The Long Arm of Coincidence: Selections from the Rosalind and Melvin Jacobs Collection. Exh. cat., Pace/MacGill Gallery, New York. Göttingen, 2009, unpaginated, ill. (reproduces Ref. Littérature 1924).

Peter MacGill in The Long Arm of Coincidence: Selections from the Rosalind and Melvin Jacobs Collection. Exh. cat., Pace/MacGill Gallery, New York. Göttingen, 2009, unpaginated.

Paul Messier in The Long Arm of Coincidence: Selections from the Rosalind and Melvin Jacobs Collection. Exh. cat., Pace/MacGill Gallery, New York. Göttingen, 2009, unpaginated.

Margaret Sundell. "From Fine Art to Fashion: Man Ray's Ambivalent Avant-Garde." PhD diss., Columbia University, 2009, pp. 2, 6, 79–91, 98–101, 104–7, 119–23, 124 n. 218, pp. 125–28, 130–36, 158–59, 166–69, 171, 219 n. 370, fig. 2.1 (unknown edition), calls it "Violon d'Ingres".

Roxana Marcoci in Roxana Marcoci. The Original Copy: Photography of Sculpture, 1839 to Today. Exh. cat., Museum of Modern Art. New York, 2010, pp. 16, 186, pl. 217.

Erin C. Garcia. Man Ray in Paris. Los Angeles, 2011, pp. 15, 72, 125, colorpl. 37, ill. p. 73 (color detail) (J. Paul Getty Museum, Los Angeles edition).

Helen Trompeteler in Terence Pepper. Man Ray: Portraits. Exh. cat., National Portrait Gallery. London, 2013, pp. 206, 209–10, 212.

Marina Warner in Terence Pepper. Man Ray: Portraits. Exh. cat., National Portrait Gallery. London, 2013, p. 13, no. 37, ill. p. 65 (Museum Ludwig Cologne edition), calls it "Le Violon d'Ingres".

Wendy A. Grossman in Man Ray–Human Equations: A Journey from Mathematics to Shakespeare. Ed. Wendy A. Grossman and Edouard Sebline. Exh. cat., Phillips Collection, Washington, D. C. Ostfildern, 2015, p. 85, calls it "Violon d'Ingres".

Adina Kamien-Karzhdan in Man Ray–Human Equations: A Journey from Mathematics to Shakespeare. Ed. Wendy A. Grossman and Edouard Sebline. Exh. cat., Phillips Collection, Washington, D. C. Ostfildern, 2015, pp. 176, 226, fig. 66 (color) (Baltimore Museum of Art edition), calls it "Le Violon d'Ingres".

Stuart Sillars in Man Ray–Human Equations: A Journey from Mathematics to Shakespeare. Ed. Wendy A. Grossman and Edouard Sebline. Exh. cat., Phillips Collection, Washington, D. C. Ostfildern, 2015, p. 215.

Adina Kamien-Karzhdan. Remaking the Readymade: Duchamp, Man Ray, and the Conundrum of the Replica. London, 2018, pp. 15, 239, 275–76, calls it "Violon d'Ingres".

Elza Adamowicz. Dada Bodies: Between Battlefield and Fairground. Manchester, England, 2019, pp. 57–59, 68 n. 33, fig. 3.6 (reproduces Ref. Littérature 1924), calls it "Le Violon d'Ingres".

Michael R. Taylor in Michael R. Taylor. Man Ray: The Paris Years. Exh. cat., Virginia Museum of Fine Arts. Richmond, Va., [2021], pp. 107, 141, fig. 50 (color) (Baltimore Museum of Art edition), calls it "Le Violon d'Ingres".

Michael R. Taylor and Madeleine Dugan in Michael R. Taylor. Man Ray: The Paris Years. Exh. cat., Virginia Museum of Fine Arts. Richmond, Va., [2021], pp. 276, 284, call it "Le Violon d'Ingres".

Mark Braude. Kiki, Man Ray: Art, Love, and Rivalry in 1920s Paris. New York, 2022, pp. 116–20, 269–70 nn., calls it "Le Violon d'Ingres".

Beth Gates Warren and Marie Difilippantonio. Julien Levy: The Man, His Gallery, His Legacy. [Newtown, Conn.], 2023, vol. 2, p. 474.

Emmanuelle de l'Ecotais. "Les 'Violon d’Ingres' de Man Ray. Une étude comparative des différents exemplaires connus." Photographica no. 6 (April 2023), pp. 155, 158, 160, 162, 164, 166–67, figs. 1 (color), 6 (installation photo, Exh. Paris 1962), 7 (diagram of different editions), 8–10 (in the conservation studio, Centre Pompidou), calls it "Le Violon d'Ingres".

Stephanie D'Alessandro in Stephanie D'Alessandro and Stephen C. Pinson. Man Ray: When Objects Dream. Exh. cat., The Metropolitan Museum of Art. New York, 2025, pp. 217–20, 305, 321 nn. 7, 10, 12, fig. 76 (reproduces Ref. Littérature 1924) colorpl. 142.

Micayla Bransfield in Stephanie D'Alessandro and Stephen C. Pinson. Man Ray: When Objects Dream. Exh. cat., The Metropolitan Museum of Art. New York, 2025, p. 294.