L'Ymagier

L'Ymagier, subtitled "A Magazine of Engravings", was a French symbolist art magazine edited by Alfred Jarry and Remy de Gourmont between 1894 and 1895. It ran for five issues and disbanded one year after its first printing, but in that time it published many prints and engravings by influential artists of the time, including Henri Rousseau.

Jarry, a French playwright and artist, and Gourmont, a novelist and poet of the same nationality, had worked in woodcuttings for many years before they joined together to form the magazine, although both men were so poor at times that they were forced to experiment with other mediums, such as linoleum and soap for their cuttings. Jarry had also been fascinated with the editorial aspects of publication since he, Francois Coulon and Louis Lormel had collaborated on L’Art Litteraire in 1893–94, which Jarry contributed to and Lormel edited. Jarry and Gourmont founded their own magazine in 1894 with a modest fortune, thus giving them a venue through which they would have complete artistic control over the expression and presentation of both their art and their interests.

Jarry wrote in L’Ymagier of the power of the direct and archetypal symbol, and set about comparing those symbols, such as the Passion and the Virgin Mary to the deliberately primitive pieces of Paul Gauguin and Émile Bernard, as well as many of his own works. The theme of the universal, primitive, and often childish forces at work in art and society was one that both Jarry and Gourmont would revisit often in their own writing and artwork, particularly in Jarry’s most famous play “Ubu Roi.” The two also attempted to impress in their magazine the rejection of an optical reality, and instead tried to return art to a place of cult and ritual, hence the heavy religious imagery which peppered several of the issues.

The first issue was published in October 1894, and was entitled “The Passion” as it contained many woodcuttings depicting the Passion of Christ. It was filled with elaborate and striking religious imagery, yet it was followed shortly by the shockingly graphic and unusual issue “Monsters” in January 1895. Following that was an issue in April 1895 entitled “The Virgin and Christ Child” and then a revisiting of “The Passion” in July of the same year. The final issue, published in October 1895 was the most sparse of all. It was entitled “Gingerbread Figures” and contained only five pictures, four published under the name Alain Jans, Jarry’s nom-de-plume, and one which was unsigned. Shortly after this issue Jarry and Gourmont separated and the magazine quietly died out.

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