Although Victor Brauner mainly worked as painter, sculptor and playwright in France, he was in fact born in Romania. He studied in Braila, Bucharest, where he held his first exhibition in 1924 at the Mozart Gallery. He founded the magazine 75 HP and, between 1928 and 1931, worked on another surrealist and dadaist magazine called UNU, where he published his paintings and drawings. He moved to Paris in 1930 where he met Constatin Brancusi, who introduced him to photography, and Yves Tanguy through whom he met the major surrealists of the time. He held his first one-man show in 1934 at the Pierre Loeb Gallery. He went back to Paris in 1945 and, in 1946, he held another one-man show at the Pierre Loeb Gallery which was followed by participation in the International Exhibition of Surrealism at the Maeght Gallery in 1947. In 1948, at the René Drouin Gallery, he held his most important exhibition. 1959 saw him participate in documenta 2 in Kassel and cut his ties with the surrealists. In the 50s, inspired by the existential philosophy of Heidegger, he produced many pictures which dealt with death in a prophetic manner. Brauner was also one of the artists chosen to represent France at the 1966 Venice Biennale. Some of his works were donated to the Musée Nationale d'Art Moderne (Georges Pompidou Centre) after his death.
