Antoine Marie Joseph Paul Artaud, better known as Antonin Artaud, was a French artist who worked across a variety of media. He is best known for his writings, as well as his work in the theatre and cinema. Widely recognized as a major figure of the European avant-garde, he had a particularly strong influence on twentieth-century theatre through his conceptualization of the Theatre of Cruelty. Known for his raw, surreal and transgressive work, his texts explored themes from the cosmologies of ancient cultures, philosophy, the occult, mysticism and indigenous Mexican and Balinese practices.
Antonin Artaud was born in Marseille, to Euphrasie Nalpas and Antoine-Roi Artaud. His parents were first cousins: his grandmothers were sisters from Smyrna (modern day İzmir, Turkey). His paternal grandmother, Catherine Chilé, was raised in Marseille, where she married Marius Artaud, a Frenchman. His maternal grandmother, Mariette Chilé, grew up in Smyrna, where she married Louis Nalpas, a local ship chandler. Euphrasie gave birth to nine children, but four were stillborn and two others died in childhood.
At age five, Artaud was diagnosed with meningitis, which had no cure at the time. Biographer David Shafer argues, however, that given the frequency of such misdiagnoses, coupled with the absence of a treatment (and consequent near-minimal survival rate) and the symptoms he had, it's unlikely that Artaud actually contracted it.Artaud attended the Collège Sacré-Coeur, a Catholic middle and high school, from 1907 to 1914. At school he began reading works by Arthur Rimbaud, Stéphane Mallarmé, and Edgar Allan Poe and founded a private literary magazine in collaboration with his friends.
Towards the end of his tenure at the Collège, Artaud noticeably withdrew from social life and "destroyed most of his written work and gave away his books".:3 Distressed, his parents arranged for him to see a psychiatrist.:25 Over the next five years Artaud was admitted to a series of sanatoria.:163
In 1916, there was a pause in Artaud's treatment when he was conscripted into the French Army.:26 He was discharged early due to "an unspecified health reason" (Artaud later claimed it was "due to sleepwalking", while his mother ascribed it to his "nervous condition").:4
In May 1919, the director of the sanatorium prescribed Artaud laudanum, precipitating a lifelong addiction to that and other opiates.:162 In March 1921, he moved to Paris where he was put under the psychiatric care of Dr Édouard Toulouse who took him in as a boarder.:29
| Date of Birth | 4th September 1896 |
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| Date of Death | 4th March 1948 |
| Age at Death | 51 Years |
| Zodiac Sign | Virgo |
| Country | France |
| Current City | Marseille |
| Birth Place | Marseille |
| Death Place | Paris |
| Nationality | France |
| Citizenship | France |
| Language | French |
| Relatives | Louis Nalpas |
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| Occupation | playwright, actor, poet, film critic, writer, essayist, screenwriter, painter, stage actor, film actor, prose writer, film director, director, comedy writer, performance artist |
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