FYI.

This story is over 5 years old.

Entertainment

Original Creators: Jean Cocteau

We take a look at some iconic artists from numerous disciplines who have left an enduring and indelible mark on today’s creators.

Each week we pay homage to a select "Original Creator"—an iconic artist from days gone by whose work influences and informs today's creators. These are artists who were innovative and revolutionary in their fields. Bold visionaries and radicals, groundbreaking frontiersmen and women who inspired and informed culture as we know it today. This week: Jean Cocteau.

The term ‘Renaissance man’ (or woman) can loosely apply to anyone whose work or areas of expertise span multiple genres, and Jean Maurice Eugène Clément Cocteau (1889-1963), who was a poet, playwright, artist, and filmmaker, was nothing if not a Renaissance man. Born on the outskirts of Paris at the end of the 19th century, young Cocteau had a rough start in life. His father committed suicide when he was a young boy, and he was expelled from private school as a teenager. But he was resilient and had his first brush with success at an early age, publishing his first book of poetry Aladdin’s Lamp when he was only 19.

Advertisement

As a burgeoning creative, Cocteau was heavily influenced by Edouard de Max, a friend and mentor who encouraged him to start writing, and Sergey Daighilev who challenged him to write the libretto for the ballet Le Dieu Bleu. His friends and contemporaries (many of whom he collaborated with) included artist Pablo Picasso, poet Raymond Radiguet, composer Igor Stravinsky, actor Jean Marais, fashion designer Coco Chanel, composer Erik Satie and singer Édith Piaf—he was known in Bohemian circles as ‘The Frivolous Prince’ (the title of a book he published at 22). He founded the publishing house Editions de la Sirene, which published his own writing, Stravinsky and Satie’s scores and the work of Les Six—a group of composers working in Montparnasse who were heavily influenced by Cocteau’s ideas.

His vast oeuvre of work deals with the tug of war between the old and the new and the paradoxical disparities that surface because of that tension—his addiction to opium also heavily affected his work. Cocteau’s ideas, as well as the collaborative nature of his work, led him to be known as one of the most influential avant-garde artists of all time. Here we look at a selection of some of his most well-known works.

Parade (1917)

A sketch of Parade’s set by Pablo Picasso

Parade was a ballet written by Cocteau and inspired by Erik Satie’s “Three Pieces on the Shape of a Pear” (who then wrote the score based on Cocteau’s scenario). The ballet was choreographed by Leonide Massine with set and costume design by Pablo Picasso—who actually made some of the costumes out of cardboard. The story circles around three groups of circus performers trying to attract audience members, and the ballet is considered one of the first examples of Surrealism, having emerged only a few years before the Surrealist art movement began in Paris.

Advertisement

Les Enfant Terribles (1929)

Les Enfant Terribles was a book written and illustrated by Cocteau in 1929, said to be written in one week during an opium withdrawal. The story follows two siblings, Paul and Elisabeth, through their isolated and twisted youth and into their equally complicated adulthood. Cocteau collaborated with Jean-Pierre Melville to direct a film adaptation in 1950, and the story inspired Philip Glass’s 2005 opera of the same name.

Orpheus (1950)

Orpheus was written and directed by Cocteau and based on the classic Greek tale. The film stars Jean Marais, one of Cocteau’s long time friends and collaborators, and was filmed using trick shots and mirrors to show the characters passing back and forth through life and death. The film has had a substantial effect on pop culture—a still from the film was used for the cover of the Smiths 1983 single “This Charming Man,” the Pet Shop Boys sample sound bytes from the film in their song “DJ Culture,” and Empire magazine called out the film in their list of “The 100 Best Films Of World Cinema” in 2010.