Kosmogonie en literaire filmkunst in Blaise Cendrars’ en Fernand Légers La fin du monde filmée par l’ange N.D.

Abstract

This essay explores the use of irony and media experimentation in Blaise Cendrars’ and Fernand Léger’s cinematographic art book La fin du monde filmée par l’ange N.D. At the beginning of the twentieth century, early film carved out new possibilities for the human sensorium. Many writers regarded the camera as a new aesthetic instrument, which redefined the common perception and understanding of the world. In Cendrars’ and Léger’s artist book the use of the camera led to a very special result: the camera was inscribed in a story about the end of the world, which is ironically twisted into the story of its resurrection.