RAY MAN: (1890-1976) American visual artist, a significant contributor to the Dada and Surrealist movements and a renowned pioneering fashion and portrait photographer. The original typescript manuscript of Man Ray´s autobiography Self-Portrait, with numerous manuscript corrections and substantial alternate readings, with accompanying carbon copies of many chapters (also with manuscript corrections), together with a series of autograph and typescript working notes, and further including a few pieces of correspondence between Man Ray and his publishers, The Atlantic Monthly Press. The manuscript, typed by Man Ray himself (the final page bearing the manuscript note ´Typed by Man Ray´) in Paris from 1960-62, is loosely contained in a number of paper folders, each annotated and titled by the artist (designated as a First Draft or First Copy), which include Part I New York (originally The Painter) comprising over eighty pages of typescript manuscript, in a paper folder (extensive and heavy tears to the edges) with manuscript title Self Portrait by Man Ray (first draft) and further marked Part I New York (p. 1-81) at the head. With a second copy of the same, retitled New York, and also including an additional eight pages, originally a continuation of The Painter, but later marked as the beginning of Part II: Paris; nine pages of typescript manuscript in a paper folder annotated by Man Ray 1st Chapter in Part II pp.82-89; sixteen pages of typescript manuscript for a chapter entitled Paul Poiret - The Portrait that was Never Made and marked as pp. 90-106; thirteen pages of typescript manuscript for a chapter entitled The True Story of Kiki of Montparnasse; fifteen pages of typescript manuscript for a chapter entitled Contacts with the Aristocracy and marked as pp. 120-134; and other typescript manuscripts for chapters entitled American & English Writers; Painters & Sculptors; Dada Films & Surrealism; The Depressing Thirties (later altered to The Fateful Thirties and finally retitled as Occupations & Evasions) representing the final chapter of Part II; thirty-two pages of typescript manuscript entitled I Discover Hollywood (Part III) followed by the final chapter, Paris Again (Part IV). In all the typescript manuscript and related carbon copies (some on onion skin paper) amounts to around seven hundred 4to pages, typed to the rectos only, much of the manuscript dedicated to Man Ray´s time in Paris and populated with numerous recollections relating to the Dada and Surrealist movements, as well as his friends and contemporaries including Pablo Picasso, Marcel Duchamp, Francis Picabia, Kiki de Montparnasse (Alice Prin), Lee Miller, Gertrude Stein, Salvador Dali, James Joyce, Tristan Tzara, Paul Eluard, Andre Breton and may others. Also included is an earlier folio typescript manuscript, with holograph corrections, of twenty-eight pages, entitled Paul Poiret (1922), written by Man Ray in Hollywood, California, and dated 15^th February 1949 (annotated to the verso of the final page to be rewritten (done Oct. 21-61) see Self-Portait, 1963). Together with Man Ray´s manuscript working notes comprising around forty pages (mainly 8vo) and covering a wide spectrum of individuals and subjects including Pablo Picasso, Dora Maar (´Dora gives up photography for painting, contrary to a book in which a painter, upon seeing Picasso, gives up painting for photography´), Marcel Duchamp (´my oldest friend´) and others, also making more general observations, ´I must keep in mind that I am doing a self portrait, therefore all references to my contemporaries should not be taken as criticism or evaluation of them, but as a clearer portrayal of myself…..After recounting these experiences, controversies, I hope my friends will revise their opinion of me – that I have been too modest – not pushed myself forward enough. Rather it has been the hopelessness of convincing the doubtful ones of the equal value of all efforts – or their futility´, and in a passage headed Ending stating ´If I have spoken at greatest length about those the least known by the majority, it complements my self portrait. At Picasso´s one day a visitor lauded him fervently saying he was the best known living painter – and what did I do, he asked? Evidently I was the best unknown living painter´. Other miscellaneous pages of typescript include an initial summary of Man Ray´s autobiography, in part, ´Following is a table of contents for an autobiography of twenty years in Paris; with some specimen pages on my arrival from New York. Also a chapter on my meeting with Paul Poiret, the famous couturier, in which is depicted his gradual decadence, and the author´s own frustration as a photographer. Each chapter may run from fifteen to thirty pages, which would make about a four hundred page book. There are many other names of personalities that may be included, not mentioned in the table of contents, without unduly prolonging the book, unless other episodes were added, which could easily run the book to seven or eight hundred pages. The use of photographs made in this period is optional. I have all my files and they contain many portraits of the people mentioned. If about twenty were used, it would liven up considerably the book….The photographs are to be regarded as documents, not as reproductions of works of art´, a brief text entitled Originals, Graphics, Multiples, and another entitled Dadamade, dated 8^th July 1958. The few pieces of correspondence include a T.L.S., Man Ray, two pages (separate leaves), 4to, Paris, 19^th July 1962, to Seymour Lawrence. Man Ray states that he has taken note of his correspondent´s letter ´and modified or deleted passages (in red ink on my copy of the manuscript) enclosing the pages involved [still present]´, explaining ´I have tried to eliminate all references to extra-marital relations as regards Donna [his first wife] and myself, Clem Randolph and Mary Reynolds. The latter is dead; I have lost track of the others including Loupov – do not know whether they are still alive. The names Donna and Loupov are modifications of the actual names: Adon Lacroix and Adolf Wolff´ and further remarking ´I do not know how to treat Donna´s defection and our separation unless I eliminate the whole episode, the most dramatic in my life. If she is still alive I do not think consulting her would arrange matters – she might blow up but it would be without consequence….she is now, if alive, a woman of about 75 years´. Man Ray continues ´There is one other pre-marital episode: my meeting with wife Juliet in Hollywood, but she is signing a waver (sic) to all libel action! I have just thought again on the subject of Donna. She was not really married to Loupov (Wolff) before, had her child with him, and after our separation she lived with other men for sixteen years until on my visit to N.Y. I arranged our divorce to please her. She would not dare to make trouble if all this was brought up…..I regret only having to eliminate the sentence “That night I lost my virginity…..” We can´t put it in later – the reader would laugh at me if I put it in after our legal wedding – I wouldn´t mind the hoax if it avoided the libel risk!´ and concludes his letter by commenting on a book by Josephson, ´there are many interesting passages, and others completely pure fantasy, as in the description of my first exhibition sponsored by the Dadaists. However, I have told the true story. I must put Josephson in the class of writers who try to present fiction as if it were fact, in contrast to those who present fact as if it were fiction, as I flatter myself to be the case´. Also included is a T.L.S. by Esther Yntema, Associate Editor at The Atlantic Monthly Press, to Man Ray, dated 27^th June 1962, regarding the final details of the publication, heavily annotated by Man Ray with his responses, and accompanied by an unsigned carbon typed copy of his reply, confirming the dedication (´For Juliet´), the epigraphs, making corrections to illustrations, and discussing the dust jacket (´I like the idea of the handprint on back. Use as pale a gold paper for the jacket as possible´). A remarkable archive of Man Ray´s own working papers and manuscripts prepared for his extraordinary autobiography, first published in New York in 1963 and republished in 1999. Some minor faults and age wear, generally VG Qty.

Provenance: From the estate of the dedicatee of Self-Portrait, Juliet Man Ray (1911-1991), later sold at Sotheby´s on 23^rd March 1995 (lot 454) and subsequently at Christie´s on 2^nd December 2004 (lot 42).