One of the most influential French writers and painters of the twentieth century, Henri Michaux (Belgian-born, 1899–1984) was known for his continual journeys into perception and consciousness. Throughout the almost sixty years of his creative life, Michaux published over thirty books of poems, narratives, essays, travelogues, journals and drawings. His visual work was shown in central museums of Europe and the United States, including the Guggenheim in New York, and the National Museum in Paris. Both oeuvres are marked by two obsessions: to delve into the darker, shadowy realms of human consciousness, and to record what he saw in the most scrupulous, exacting fashion he could muster, whether it be through language, drawing, or paint. Throughout, one can trace the struggle for, and his disappointment in not finding, a universal language through gesture, mark, sign, and the word.