Tota Cuevas de Vera : l'amour au temps du surréalisme

A muse and patron, a friend of Tristan Tzara, René Char, Paul Éluard and Michel Leiris, and a devoted companion to René Crevel during his final years, Tota, Countess Cuevas de Vera (1887–1970), was one of the most influential women of the Surrealist movement. She moved through the circles of this early 20th-century avant-garde with a rare freedom, driven by a presence that left a lasting impression on all who met her.

Travelling between Paris, Madrid and Latin America, she forged links, brought worlds together, inspired, supported and spread ideas from one continent to another. Close to Salvador Dalí, Pablo Picasso and Luis Buñuel, and committed to the cause of the Spanish Republicans, she stood at the heart of the artistic and political upheavals of her time. A friend of the patron Eugenia Errázuriz and associated with Jean-Michel Frank, she supported artists, encouraged writers and bridged artistic sensibilities. A conduit for influences and an adventurer in taste, she contributed, with rare intuition, to the emergence of new ideas. From Jorge Luis Borges to Adolfo Bioy Casares, from Rafael Alberti to Victoria Ocampo, all recognised her as a unique presence.

Drawing on a wealth of previously unpublished material, this first biography of Tota Cuevas de Vera reveals the vital role played by this woman, long overlooked by history, and brilliantly restores her rightful place at the heart of the 20th-century avant-garde.