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Bas Les Masques ! Pour Une Relecture Socio-Économique Du Montparnasse Des Années 1920, Léa Saint-Raymond

Artl@s Bulletin

This paper attempts to reconstruct the Parisian art world of the 1920s through the prism of the social sciences. Geography, sociology and network analysis shed new light on a caricature drawn by Sem, entitled Les Montparnos, which was published in 1929 in L’Illustration. The reconstruction of the artistic field strips away the masks, and leads us to conclude that Sem, the star of the Parisian Belle Epoque, was trying to reverse the stigma of his increasingly marginalized position by mocking a new generation of rising stars—such as Foujita, Man Ray, and Kiki de Montparnasse—who were starting to dominate …