Little Tables around the Earth (Petites tables autour de la terre) from Natural History (Histoire naturelle)

Little Tables around the Earth (Petites tables autour de la terre) from Natural History (Histoire naturelle) is a foundational Surrealist print by Max Ernst. Created around c. 1925 and formally published in the influential 1926 portfolio Histoire naturelle, this piece is one of 34 collotypes derived from Ernst’s revolutionary technique of frottage. Frottage, derived from the French word meaning "to rub," involves placing paper over textured objects and rubbing with pencil or charcoal to capture the surface relief. This automatic method allowed the artist to bypass conscious design and tap directly into subconscious imagery, a core principle of the Surrealist movement developing in France during this period.

The resulting image suggests a whimsical yet cosmological arrangement: small, distinct tables appear to orbit or stand precariously around an amorphous, central planetary form. Ernst exploited the spontaneous texture yielded by frottage to create these biomorphic and mechanical forms, intentionally blurring the line between inanimate object and organic matter. This series of works, compiled and published in 1926, significantly expanded the vocabulary of modern art, asserting the importance of automatism and chance operations in the creation of art. The imagery in Little Tables around the Earth reflects Ernst's ongoing fascination with scientific diagrams, astronomy, and the irrational juxtaposition of common objects.

As a seminal example of the Dada and Surrealist approach to printmaking, the collotype confirms the centrality of mechanical reproduction in Ernst’s output. This graphic work demonstrates how the artist repurposed existing reproductive methods to create entirely new, visionary art. This example of the experimental prints from the Histoire naturelle portfolio, produced during the height of the French avant-garde, is a key piece in the collection of the Museum of Modern Art (MoMA), New York.