Salvador Dali, Pantagruel or Henry II from Les Songes Drôlatiques de Pantagruel, Original Large Lithograph, 1973

Salvador Dali
"Pantagruel, ou Henri II" (Pantagruel, or Henry II, king of France)
from "Les Songes Drôlatiques de Pantagruel" (The Drolatic Dreams of Pantagruel)
from the rarest edition of 50 only

Original Lithograph on Japan paper
year: 1973
76 x 56 cm ca
Hand-signed
Hand-numbered 8/50

Catalogue Raisonné:
R.Michler and L. W. Löpsinger
"Salvador Dali, Catalogue Raisonné of Prints II - Lithographs and Wood Engravings 1956-1980" pages 155 - ref. 1404

with Certificate

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HISTORY of This Artwork

Sometime in the 1960s, Spanish surrealist artist Salvador Dali, already considered one of the leading artists worldwide, discovered a special book published in Paris in 1565 by Richard Breton, as the 'last work' of the writer François Rabelais, and named it after his bestseller about the Giant Pantagruel. This book, "Les Songes Drôlatiques de Pantagruel", i.e. The Drolatic Dreams of Pantagruel (where 'Drolatic' means funny and amusing), consists of 120 woodcuts, each page showing a completely different figure: strange, hybrid creatures, combinations of man and animal, insect, plant and object, pot-bellied or hunchbacked, with special noses, snouts, trunks or beaks; each having a title in the end of the book.
Enraptured and inspired by the new discovery, he chose 25 images and devised variations on these then four-century-old prints. These images have been printed as original lithographs at Atelier Grapholith in Paris, and published by Carpentier in Geneve in 1973.

This very artwork is one meant to represent Pantagruel, i.e. also Henry II, king of France.

Here the original text in French (an English translation follows):

Ce personnage monstrueux, armé du sabre et de la hallebarde, portant un masque de peau qui le couvre de la tête jusqu'au ventre, surmonté d'une aigrette figurant des cornes de capricorne, dont le priape est terminé par une tête de bouc muselée par un anneau, duquel pend un cordon, est le grand Pantagruel, courant en bonnes for-tunes, affublé de la peau du même bouc, et prêt à faire voir, comme il est dit de lui au vi chap. des pronostications: "La brave entree du soleil en Capricornus, et si plus en sçavez n'en dites mot..." Rabelais joue ici sur le mot capricornus, par lequel il entend les cornes du croissant de la belle Diane de Poitiers, sa maîtresse, et entend Pantagruel, son amant, par le soleil, auquel on compare souvent les rois. L'anneau qui musèle son priape, et le cordon qui le conduit, indiquent bien que cette belle le menoit par le bout du nez. C'est en effet le portrait que Rabelais trace de Pantagruel, liv. II, chap. XXXI, en ces termes: "Car j'ose bien dire que c'estoyt le meilleur petit bonhomme qui feult d'icy au bout d'un baston.." et au liv. III, chap. II: «Je vous ai ja dit et encore redy, que c'estoyt le meilleur petit et grand bon hommet qu'oncques ceignyt espee".

This monstrous character, armed with a saber and a halberd, wearing a skin mask that covers him from head to belly, surmounted by an aigrette representing Capricorn horns, whose priapus is terminated by a goat's head muzzled by a ring, from which hangs a cord, is the great Pantagruel, running in good fortune, decked out in the skin of the same goat, and ready to show, as is said of him in the sixth chapter of prognostications: "The brave entry of the sun into Capricornus, and if more know not say a word about it..." Rabelais here plays on the word capricornus, by which he means the horns of the crescent of the beautiful Diane de Poitiers, his mistress, and means Pantagruel, her lover, by the sun, to which kings are often compared. The ring that muzzles his priapus, and the cord that leads him, clearly indicate that this beauty led him by the tip of the nose. This is indeed the portrait that Rabelais paints of Pantagruel, book II, chap. XXXI, in these terms: "For I dare say that he was the best little fellow who came from here to the end of a stick..." and in book III, chap. II: "I have already told you and again, that he was the best little and great fellow that ever girded a sword."
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Sold with certificate of authenticity, copy of the catalogue raisonné, and copy of the original woodcut and which inspired Dali (we have it in our collection)