SurrealismSurrealism is a cultural

movement and artistic style that was founded in 1924 by André Breton. Surrealism style uses visual imagery from the subconscious mind to create art without the intention of logical comprehensibility.

Surrealism The movement was begun primarily in

Europe, centered in Paris, and attracted many of the members of the Dada community. Influenced by the psychoanalytical work of Freud and Jung, there are similarities between the Surrealist movement and the Symbolist movement of the late 19th century.

Surrealism Some of the greatest artists of the

20th century became involved in the Surrealist movement, and the group included Giorgio de Chirico, Salvador Dali, René Magritte, and many others.

The Surrealist movement eventually spread across the globe, and has influenced artistic endeavors from painting and sculpture to pop music and film directing.

SurrealismFrench writer André Breton (1896-1966). At first a Dadaist, he wrote three manifestos about Surrealism — in 1924, 1930, and 1934, and opened a studio for "surrealist research."

manifesto manifesto - A public declaration of

principles, policies, or intentions. Although usually of a political nature, there is a history in art, especially in modernism during the first half of the twentieth century, of the spokesmen of various avant-garde movements publishing manifestos which declare their theories, motivations and direction, stimulating support for them or reactions against them.

Surrealism Influenced by the theories of the

pioneer of psychoanalysis, Sigmund Freud (German, 1856-1939), the images found in surrealist works are as confusing and startling as those of dreams. Surrealist works can have a realistic, though irrational style, precisely describing dreamlike fantasies.

Surrealism/PsychologyThe artistic style of surrealism

began as an official movement shortly after the end of the first world war. In its infancy, it was a literary movement, but soon found its greatest expression in the visual arts.

Surrealism/PsychologyIn general, the style focuses on psychological states which resemble dreams and fantasy.

Surrealism Influences The artists were influenced by

psychological research of Sigmund Freud and Carl Jung, who sought to explain the workings of the mind through analysis of the symbols of dreams. Instead of using psychoanalysis to cure themselves of any disturbances, the surrealists saw the unconscious as a wellspring of untapped creative ideas.

Surrealism Influences "A dream that is not interpreted is like a

letter that is not opened" is a famous quote from Freud. The surrealists were less interested in interpretation of their dream symbols than they were in the expressive capacity of such

Surrealism Influences The surrealists admired the artwork of the

insane for its freedom of expression, as well as artworks created by children. They admired previous artists such as Henri Rousseau, whose naive and self-taught works always contained an element of surreal fantasy. In addition, they looked for inspiration from masters of the Renaissance such as Hieronymous Bosch and Pieter Brueghel, whose fantastic elements can easily be described as surreal.

Hieronymous Bosch

Pieter Brueghel

Henri Rousseau

Summary

The word "surreal", in fact, means "above reality". In other words, the artists believed that there was an element of truth which is revealed by our subconscious minds which supercedes the reality of our everyday consciousness.

SummaryEarly Surrealist work began with

such chance techniques as rubbing a pencil over a paper placed on boards to see what the grain would suggest. Ernst used this technique and also spread paint at random on canvas and squashed it with paper to see what the resulting shapes and textures would suggest.

Summary Such techniques were visual

extensions of Breton’s unconscious writing and like Dr. Rorschach’s psychological ink blot tests of 1921, were exercises in responding to and interpreting visual data freely.

Summary Later extensions of this approach

developed into sophisticated presentations of logical or recognizable subject matter in very illogical situations or weird associations. Much of the later Surrealism developed around personal symbols which were unexplained by the artists.

Salvador Dali(1904-1989)

Salvador Dali(1904-1989) Born on May 11, 1904, Salvador Dali

would become one of the world’s most recognized surrealist artists. Raised by his lawyer/notary father and a mother who encouraged her artistic son, Dali grew up in Figueres, Catalonia, Spain, having been told by his parents that he was the reincarnation of his older brother, Salvador, who died just nine months before Dali’s birth.

Salvador Dali(1904-1989) Following the death of his mother to

breast cancer in 1921, Dali moved to the student residences at the School of Fine Arts in Madrid. He spent several years studying there and then shortly before his graduation, he was expelled for declaring that no one on the faculty of the school was competent enough to examine him.

Salvador Dali(1904-1989) By 1931, Dali had collaborated on a

short film with surrealist director Luis Bunuel; illustrated a book called “The Witches of Liers”, a poem written by his friend and classmate Carles Fages de Climent; met his muse and future wife Gala; and painted arguably his most famous work The Persistence of Memory. He had officially joined the surrealist group in Paris, and was hailed by the surrealist community of artists.

Salvador Dali(1904-1989) When Salvador Dali openly supported

the regime of Francisco Franco following the Spanish Civil war, and showed interest in what he referred to as the “Hitler phenomenon”, he became somewhat of an outcast among his fellow artists. Many of his fellow surrealists referred to Dali in past tense, indicating their feeling that he was dead to them. He wrote prolifically during this time, and continued producing his art.

Salvador Dali(1904-1989)In 1940, Dali and Gala moved

to the United States, and it was during this time that Dali reclaimed his Catholic faith. In 1942, Dali wrote his autobiography, “The Secret Life of Salvador Dali”. He asked an Italian monk to perform an exorcism on him in the late

Salvador Dali(1904-1989) 1940’s, and in exchange for the

exorcism, he presented the friar with a sculpture of Jesus Christ on the cross, which was not discovered until 2005. Although they had been married civilly in 1934, Dali and Gala were married in the Catholic Church in 1958.

Salvador Dali(1904-1989) In the late 1940’s, Dali and Gala

returned to Spain. Dali continued a prolific career in art, being one of the first artists to use holography and taking great inspiration from his Catholic faith and the events of the day, including the bombing at Hiroshima. From this time period, two of Dali’s most famous works, Hallucinogenic Toreador and La Gare de Perpignan were created.

Dali Dali’s work was used in advertising

campaigns, most notably for Chupa Chups candy and Lanvin chocolates, and he became fascinated by DNA and the hypercube, which can be seen in some of his later work

Salvador Dali(1904-1989)King Juan Carlos of Spain

bestowed upon Dali the title Marquis of Pubol in 1982. By this time, Dali was seriously ill, having been given unprescribed medicine by his senile wife Gala. The medications damaged Dali’s nervous system and gave him Parkinson’s like tremors in his hands.

Gala died in 1982, leaving the stricken Dali devastated. He was brought back to Figueres in 1984 by friends who felt a deliberate dehydration of the artist and a fire in his bedroom were suicide attempts.

Salvador Dali(1904-1989) On January 23, 1989, Salvador Dali,

known for his contributions not only to surrealism, but also to fashion, theatre, and photography, died from heart failure. He is buried in a crypt at his Teatro Museo de Figueres, just steps from his childhood home.

The Persistence of Memory 1931

The Persistence of Memory The Persistence of Memory almost stands

alone as a symbol of the movement. The melted clocks represent the strange warping of time which occurs when we enter the dream state. The stretched image of a man's face which is at the center of the painting is believed to be that of Dali himself, and the landscape which stretches out behind the scene may perhaps represent his birthplace, Catalonia.

Metamorphis of Narcissus 1937

Metamorphosis of Narcissus The Metamorphosis of Narcissus plays on

the classical theme about a beautiful young man who admires his own reflection in a pool of water. Transfixed by his own beauty, he turns to stone. Always the master of illusion, Dali creates a double-image, where the boy's form is repeated as an enlarged hand holding an egg which bursts forth with a narcissus flower.

The Hallucinogenic Torreador 1969

The Hallucinogenic Torreador The Hallucinogenic Torreador is

perhaps Dali's most successful painting involving multiple hidden images. A complete analysis of the painting would be a complex undertaking. It primarily focuses on the torreador (bull-fighter), whose face is hidden within the repeated representation of the Venus de Milo.

The Hallucinogenic Torreador The upper portion of the painting contains

the bull-fighter's arena, again surrounded by multiple images of the goddess. There is also a hidden image of the bull in the lower left quadrant of the painting (drinking water from a pool), and an image of a boy (possibly a self-portrait as a child, as his clothing represents the approximate time period of his boyhood).

Crucifixion 1954

The Crucifixion The Crucifixion is another powerful

painting. The innovation of a floating cross which intersects Christ's body gives an illusion of another dimension. A shocking aspect of this painting is that the representation is believed to be a self-portrait. The single figure who stands in adoration is believed to be that of his wife, Gala (who often appeared in his paintings).