Nusch Éluard (born Maria Benz; 21 June 1906 – 28 November 1946) was a French performer,

model A model is an informative representation of an object, person or system. The term originally denoted the plans of a building in late 16th-century English, and derived via French and Italian ultimately from Latin ''modulus'', a measure. Models c ...

and

surrealist Surrealism is a cultural movement that developed in Europe in the aftermath of World War I in which artists depicted unnerving, illogical scenes and developed techniques to allow the unconscious mind to express itself. Its aim was, according to ...

artist. Born Maria Benz in

Mulhouse Mulhouse (; Alsatian: or , ; ; meaning '' mill house'') is a city of the Haut-Rhin department, in the Grand Est region, eastern France, close to the Swiss and German borders. It is the largest city in Haut-Rhin and second largest in Alsace a ...

(then part of the German Empire), she met Swiss architect and artist

Max Bill Max Bill (22 December 1908 – 9 December 1994) was a Swiss architect, artist, painter, typeface designer, industrial designer and graphic designer. Early life and education Bill was born in Winterthur. After an apprenticeship as a silversm ...

in the Odeon Café in

Zürich , neighboring_municipalities = Adliswil, Dübendorf, Fällanden, Kilchberg, Maur, Oberengstringen, Opfikon, Regensdorf, Rümlang, Schlieren, Stallikon, Uitikon, Urdorf, Wallisellen, Zollikon , twintowns = Kunming, San Francisco Zürich ...

; he nicknamed her "Nusch", a name she would stick to. Their liaison ended after six months when Max Bill's plan to marry her in order to avoid her pending extradition from Switzerland was vetoed by his father (to whom he owed a substantial amount of money due to medical expenses following an accident which had forced him to leave the

Bauhaus The Staatliches Bauhaus (), commonly known as the Bauhaus (), was a German art school operational from 1919 to 1933 that combined crafts and the fine arts.Oxford Dictionary of Art and Artists (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 4th edn., 20 ...

Paris

Nusch arrived in France as a stage performer, variously described as a small-time actress, a traveling acrobat, and a "hypnotist's stooge". She met

Paul Éluard Paul Éluard (), born Eugène Émile Paul Grindel (; 14 December 1895 – 18 November 1952), was a French poet and one of the founders of the Surrealist movement. In 1916, he chose the name Paul Éluard, a matronymic borrowed from his maternal ...

in 1930 working as a model, married him in 1934, produced surrealist

photomontage Photomontage is the process and the result of making a composite photograph by cutting, gluing, rearranging and overlapping two or more photographs into a new image. Sometimes the resulting composite image is photographed so that the final image ...

and other work, and is the subject of "Facile," a collection of Éluard's poetry published as a photogravure book, illustrated with

Man Ray Man Ray (born Emmanuel Radnitzky; August 27, 1890 – November 18, 1976) was an American visual artist who spent most of his career in Paris. He was a significant contributor to the Dada and Surrealist movements, although his ties to eac ...

's nude photographs of her. She was also the subject of several

cubist Cubism is an early-20th-century avant-garde art movement that revolutionized European painting and sculpture, and inspired related movements in music, literature and architecture. In Cubist artwork, objects are analyzed, broken up and reassemble ...

portraits and sketches by

Pablo Picasso Pablo Ruiz Picasso (25 October 1881 – 8 April 1973) was a Spanish painter, sculptor, printmaker, ceramicist and Scenic design, theatre designer who spent most of his adult life in France. One of the most influential artists of the 20th ce ...

in the late 1930s, and is said to have had an affair with him. Nusch worked for the

French Resistance The French Resistance (french: La Résistance) was a collection of organisations that fought the German occupation of France during World War II, Nazi occupation of France and the Collaborationism, collaborationist Vichy France, Vichy régim ...

during the Nazi occupation of France during World War II. She died in 1946 in

Paris Paris () is the Capital city, capital and List of communes in France with over 20,000 inhabitants, most populous city of France, with an estimated population of 2,165,423 residents in 2019 in an area of more than 105 km² (41 sq mi), ma ...

due to a stroke.

Photographs and paintings

* Dora Maar:
"Les années vous guettent" The years await you (Nusch Éluard)
', 1932 * Man Ray:
Nusch Éluard
', 1934 * Man Ray, Paul Éluard:
Facile
', 1935

* Man Ray:
Nusch Éluard
', 1936 * Man Ray:
Sonia Mossé & Nusch Éluard
', 1936 * Man Ray:
Lee Miller & Nusch Éluard
', 1930s * Man Ray:
Ady & Nusch Éluard
1937
/ref> * Man Ray:
Ady Fidelin & Nusch Éluard
1937 * Man Ray:
Adrienne Fidelin & Nusch Éluard
1937'' * Pablo Picasso:

', Charcoal & pencil on canvas, 1938

References

External links

Nusch, portrait d'une muse du Surréalisme
ARTELITTERA,¨PARIS, mars 2010 {{DEFAULTSORT:Eluard, Nusch 1906 births 1946 deaths Actors from Mulhouse French artists' models French surrealist artists Women surrealist artists Burials at Père Lachaise Cemetery