Kiki Souvenirs

Kiki de Montparnasse [Alice Prin]. Preface by Foujita.

Paris. Henri Broca. 1929. First edition. Printed wrappers, with illustration pasted to front. 174 pages. Many b&w photographs and illustrations by Kiki, Man Ray and others. 230 x 185mm (9 x 7¼"). 0.5kg. . French. Very good; light shelf wear with some light marks to ivory wrappers, slight browning to wrappers and pages; clean with no inscriptions, binding remains tight.

The memoirs of Kiki de Montparnasse in the original French edition of 1929. Alice Prin, better known as "Kiki", was a bohemian creative, an embodiment of the Parisian culture of the 1920s. She was an artist in her own right, but also a muse and model for Man Ray, Foujita, Moïse Kisling and many other artists. Her memoirs cover her life to date beginning with her childhood. Chapter include Man Ray, En Posant, Monsieur W, Le Jockey, Villefranche 1925, En Prison and Montparnasse. The text is accompanied by twenty reproductions of Kiki's paintings, 10 b&w photographs by Man Ray, some photographs and illustrations by Kiki and reproductions of portraits by Foujita, Kisling, Hermine David, Per Krohg, Mayo and Tono Salazar. The book was published in English in 1930 with a new preface by Ernest Hemingway, but was banned by the US until the 1970s for its explicit content.