Marcel Broodthaers: Une Seconde d'Éternité: Flipbook

In 1970, Belgian artist and poet Marcel Broodthaers (1924–76) created several films―including Une Seconde d’Éternité d’après une idée de Charles Baudelaire, or "A Second of Eternity According to an Idea of Charles Baudelaire"―in which he updated the 19th-century poet’s ideas of creativity and narcissism for the age of cinema. Broodthaers created the film using animation, tracing the strokes of his signature on 24 frames of film (one per second), opening the camera shutter every time that he changed or manipulated the image. The artist toys with the idea of a signature: typically the artist’s guarantee of a work’s completion and authenticity, here the signature is notable for the absence of work it accompanies. This volume, formatted as a paperback flipbook, is the perfect companion to and interpretation of the acclaimed film.