SwissArtGallery · Documented identity

Raoul Ubac

Active in photography, painting and sculpture, Raoul Ubac (1910–1985) developed a body of work documented by works and projects across these different fields. After studying at the Athénée royal de Malmedy until 1928, he enrolled at the École d’arts appliqués in Cologne, where he studied drawing and photography, then took up printmaking at Stanley Hayter’s Atelier 17. In 1934, under the name Raoul Michelet, he published a collection with Camille Bryen combining poems and photographs. The following year, under this pseudonym, he took part in the Exposition internationale du Surréalisme in La Louvière. For the Surrealist exhibition organised in Paris in January 1938, André Breton commissioned him to photograph the mannequins on display.

Between 1936 and 1940, the photographic series «Le Combat de Penthésilée» employed reversal, solarisation and photomontage. «La Rue derrière la gare» (1936), also made using photomontage, and «La Nébuleuse» (1939), produced by burning, attest to the range of processes used in his photographic work. In 1942, he illustrated «Exercice de la pureté» by Jean Lescure. In his paintings, Ubac used a mortar made of slate powder mixed with synthetic resins, which he engraved and sanded. From 1951, the Galerie Aimé Maeght regularly exhibited his gouaches and canvases. His works also include a bas-relief for the drinking pavilion in Évian in 1957 and a Stations of the Cross for the Chapelle Saint-Bernard of the Fondation Maeght in 1964.

In 1968, a retrospective of his work was presented in Brussels and at the Musée d’art moderne de la Ville de Paris. The Art Institute of Chicago lists several works under the name Rodolphe Raoul Ubac, including «Agui Ubac» (1937), «Head» (1950) and «Edges of Becoming (Lisières du Devenir)» (1963). Later, Galerie Laurentin presented a retrospective in Brussels in 2015, followed by an exhibition devoted to Ubac in Paris in 2017.

This profile brings together identity references for Raoul Ubac and paintings, drawings and works on paper documented in auction catalogues.

1 references are documented at DognyAuction. Each record links to its source; the amounts are not a general valuation of the artist’s work.

Works recorded at auction

DognyAuction

Light at Night

Pastel

Original catalogue wording

La lumière la nuit
pastel

Date to be documented

Published result : 1248 CHF

Fees not specified in the available data

View the lot at the auction house ↗

Sources and references

• Reference record
• ARTIC · Reference link only; institutional text and images are not reproduced.
• LoC · Reference link only; institutional text and images are not reproduced.
• Documentary source
• Documentary source
• Documentary source
• Documentary source

SwissArtGallery documentary note based on the cited sources. Titles, media and qualifications are provided in the profile language; the original catalogue wording remains available in each record.
Documentation updated : 2026-10-19