Antonin Artaud was born on September 4, 1896, in Marseilles, France. He called himself Antonin in order to be distinguished from his father Antoine.  While growing up, Artaud contracted many illnesses such as meningitis. He suffered terrible head pains and contractions of the facial and tongue nerves. These contractions caused a fitful stutter.

He was educated at the College du Sacre Cour from 1906 to 1914. During this time he suffered a nervous breakdown and spent the next five years undergoing "rest cures" at a variety of clinics and thermal spas.

His earliest existing drawings date from 1915 when he was undergoing his first experience of the psychological depression that was to affect him for the whole of his adult life.

Artaud was drafted into the French Infantry in 1916 and served nine months before being discharged on medical grounds. 

In his mid-20's, Artaud suffered financial difficulties which forced him into the acting business.  He played Marat in Abel Gance's "Napoleon" (1925) and Massieu in Carl Dreyer's " La Passion de Jeanne d' Arc" (1927).  Continuing through 1935, his acting placed him in about twenty motion pictures.

Influences

After World War II, Artuad resumed his drawing and described his work as dessins-ecrits pointing to the picture's status between text and image.  These drawings depicted guns, coffins, skulls, human limbs and sexual parts.  Clearly some of the dominant themes are brutality, death and destruction, which are the dominant themes of war.  From these drawings, it is easy to see the infleunce of and war.