Plate (folio 11 verso) from La Fin du monde filmée par l'ange de N.-D. (The End of the World Filmed by the Angel of Notre Dame)

Plate (folio 11 verso) from La Fin du monde filmée par l'ange de N.-D. (The End of the World Filmed by the Angel of Notre Dame) by Fernand Léger is a seminal example of the French graphic arts produced immediately following World War I. Dating to 1919, the image is one component of an ambitious illustrated book project that incorporated twenty-two unique pochoirs. This particular plate employs a combination of line block printing with the pochoir (stencil) technique, a method favored by the avant-garde for its ability to produce stark, mechanically precise fields of color.

The technique itself is crucial to the work’s meaning, reflecting Léger’s enduring fascination with industrial aesthetics and the concept of reproducibility. The book's total structure-twenty-two pochoirs, six of which also include a line block, plus two line blocks on the covers-highlights the artist's commitment to graphic media as a vehicle for disseminating the visual language of the machine age. Léger moved away from traditional figurative painting during this period, embracing geometric abstraction and standardized forms that characterized his Mechanical Period.

This 1919 composition embodies the dynamism and fragmented visual logic of cinematic experience, reinforcing the book’s provocative subtitle. Léger’s stark, primary color palette and bold black outlines create a powerful sense of movement and volume, capturing the chaotic energy of the modern urban environment. The work demonstrates the artist's attempt to synthesize fine art with popular media and graphic design during a foundational moment in modern art history.

This important example of French Modernism is housed within the collection of the Museum of Modern Art (MoMA). As a historic print and an early illustrated book, reproductions and prints of La Fin du monde filmée par l'ange de N.-D. continue to influence graphic designers and historians today, with many of the underlying images now accessible through the public domain.