This plate, representing one of the illustrations Strawinsky had created for Ramuz’s work Le Cirque, was not appreciated by the writer who suggested replacing the tightrope walker “with another cord dancer rather more in keeping with the text”. In 1937, after the book had been published, André Guex wrote in Vie: Revue romande: “It certainly requires pluck to illustrate a text by Ramuz! Strictly speaking, it’s rather like illustrating a picture book”. Philippe Kaenel

Noces et autres histoires was published in 1943. The text, written by Ramuz in the years 1916-1917, was made up of literary transpositions of pieces of music by Igor Stravinsky, inspired by Russian folklore. Théodore transposed the same ‘tone’ to the visual plane. His sources of inspiration were Epinal prints and Russian lubki. For each copy of this ‘semi-luxury’ edition, he decked his characters in colour using the pochoir technique. Philippe Kaenel