Founded and published by Raoul Ubac (1910-1985) and Magritte in 1940, no. 1 appeared in February 1940 and no. 2 in April 1940. Ubac was a Belgian artist who lived in Paris between 1930 and 1939. When he returned to Belgium he sought to bring together the Brussels Group and the Surrealists from Hainaut to put forth a collective stance stressing the Surrealist state of mind during the dark times leading up to World War II. The result of this effort was the publication of l’Invention Collective.

Leading up to the publication of l’Invention Collective Ubac, Magritte, Mariën, and others signed and circulated a letter in which they stated:

On the dark threshold of 1940, although the walls everywhere are cracking and collapsing on every side, it is important for us to keep intact THE STATE OF MIND which Surrealism created in the form of poetic precipitate...Thanks to it, poetry secures its essential elements: freedom of imagination and of dream-states, the transparence of love, and man can from now on include living landscapes in the night of his consciousness.

1. L'Invention Collective. Brussels, 1940. Cover, February 1940 (no. 1).
2. L'Invention Collective. Brussels, 1940. Spread, February 1940 (no. 1).
3. L'Invention Collective. Brussels, 1940. Cover, April 1940 (no. 2).
4. L'Invention Collective. Brussels, 1940. Spread, April 1940 (no. 2).
5. Collective Inventions: Surrealism in Belgium. Allmer and Hilde Van Gelder, eds. Belgium: Leuven University Press, 2007.
6. Collective Inventions: Surrealism in Belgium. Allmer and Hilde Van Gelder, eds. Belgium: Leuven University Press, 2007.
7. Collective Inventions: Surrealism in Belgium. Allmer and Hilde Van Gelder, eds. Belgium: Leuven University Press, 2007. Cover.