The different meanings of the word screen may appear paradoxical since it refers to both openingness and closingness, to dissimulation and exposure. The 19thcentury writing yet enlightens this semantic evolution which then become more important in artistic thinking. In Honoré de Balzac's novels, the screen is a fashionable oriental fan which metaphorizes dissimulation between social beings. In George Sand or Maxime du Camp writings, and later in Pierre Loti's pictural descriptions, the ornemental nature of the screen makes it an ideal projection for dreams and imagination. Being thus transformed into creative canvas, the screen could only become for Émile Zola and Stéphane Mallarmé the ideal theoretical tool to think what an artistic work really is.