"Elles sont de sortie" is the title of a periodic publication launched in 1977 by Pascal Doury and Bruno Richard. The plural and feminine form of the enigmatic phrase "elles sont de sortie," chosen almost by chance, announces a protean work and often collective experience. From its origins to the most recent iterations, including Doury's more confidential individual trajectory after "Elles sont de sortie," Choquer le Monde à Mort traces five decades of a corpus of nearly three hundred publications. It addresses some of the most emblematic editorial works, as well as others that remain unpublished, alongside ambitious and sometimes scandalous exhibitions, few of which are documented.
This work is the result of several years of research, enriched by numerous firsthand interviews, and unfolds in three parts: a chronology and analysis of a singular and marginal artistic history, works and iconographic documents, and an anthology bibliography. Together, these elements reveal the complexity of an editorial object with porous boundaries, both in its forms and its contents, oscillating between graphzine, artist book, poetry collection, and personal journal. Its ramifications, status, and legacy retrospectively reveal the importance of a discreet yet seminal work.
Thus, "Elles Sont de Sortie" also serves as an opportunity to revisit the paths of two aesthetic and provocative artists, deeply devoted to their art and true free spirits in an art world often too narrow for them. It immerses us in a plethora of works that are intimate and raw, as well as subtle and refined, all in service of a project that, in Doury's words, aims to "shock the world to death."
Jonas Delaborde (born 1981) is a French artist, publisher, and art historian. His practice, as well as the focus of his research, relates to artist books, self-publishing, and their recent or marginal occurrences. Delaborde works regularly with his fellow Hendrik Hegray (they edit the nasty & absurd Nazi Knife zine together), Kerozen and Mehdi Hercberg (Shoboshobo) or with the drawing collective Frederic Magazine.
Artist, illustrator and poetry publisher Pascal Doury (1956-2001) was both a luminous and obscure figure of French counter-culture. In the 1980s, he co-edited the graphic magazine Elles sont de sortie with Bruno Richard. Close to the French punk aesthetic, he notably collaborated with Olivia Clavel of the Bazooka collective, but also with Marc Caro (Delicatessen) and writer Christophe Tarkos. His work has been published by Les Humanoïdes associés.
Bruno Richard (born 1956 in Curepipe, Mauritius) is a French artist, illustrator and graphic designer. Co-founder with Pascal Doury of the graphzine Elles sont de sortie (ESDS) in the 1970s, he is one of the leading figures of the French punk and underground movements, known the world over.
