Surrealism And Andre Breton, The Founder Of Surrealism

This is a cultural movement that began in the early 1920s, and is best known for its visual artworks and writings. Artists sought to channel the unconscious to unlock the power of the imagination. They believed the rational mind repressed the power of the imagination. Artist’s images were outlandish and perplexing. It is meant to jolt the viewer out of their comforting imagery. Nature was a frequent imagery. Salvador Dali’s works often included ants or eggs. The Accommodations of Desire in 1929 was an important piece of art. It is a prime example of his ability to portray his vivid bizarre dreams. He developed a paranoid-critical method that involved irrational thought and self-induced paranoia to access his unconscious. It combined his usual hyper-realistic painting style with more experimental collage techniques.

the human eye. Visualize having the ability to completely free your imagination, letting your thoughts and desires wander to form exotic scenes or locations. These unfamiliar worlds lay deep inside of the brain as subconscious thoughts, usually undetected by the person with them in his or her possession. With the help of the intriguing art movement known as Surrealism, however, these subconscious thoughts are finally able to be brought to fruition. Surrealism is a unique style of art that originated in France with the help of brilliant writer André Breton (Chilvers 599). He defined surrealism and its principles as a “purely psychic automatism through which we undertake to express, in words, writing, or any other activity, the actual functioning of thought… Surrealism rests upon belief in the higher reality of specific forms of associations, previously neglected, in the omnipotence of dreams, and in the disinterested play of thinking” (Chilvers 599). He also strongly emphasized that its purpose was “to resolve the previously contradictory conditions of dream and reality into an absolute reality, a super-reality” (Chilvers 599). Surrealism is a 20th century style of painting which rebels against traditional notions of art. In order to understand this genre, it is necessary to examine the movement’s characteristics, representative

World War 1 was a gruesome point in history that led to immense carnage and anguish of millions. However, on a happier note, this dark time was followed by movements such as Cubism, Precisionism, and Expressionism. Among these movements existed Surrealism, a movement that would not have come to be without the influence of “the war to end all wars”.

Dali employs a “concrete irrationality” surrealist style giving us the illusion of realism. Design is precise, using symmetrical perspective employing a geometrical figure’s composition. The painting is well balanced. Presence of the light coming from the northeast gives a sense of a natural landscape. The light and shadow relationship “pops the elements out” and creates contrast. The pain of war is expressed by the grotesque mutating human body ripping itself apart with the anguishing facial expression.

Surrealism is a movement that built off of the burgeoning look into art, psychology, and the workings of the mind. Popularly associated with the works of Salvador Dali, Surrealist art takes imagery and ideology and creates correlation where there is none, creating new forms of art. In this essay I will look to explore the inception of the surrealist movement, including the Surrealist Manifesto, to stress the importance of these artists and their work in the 20th century and beyond. I also will look to films from our European Cinema course to express how films incorporate the influence of surrealism both intentionally and unintentionally.

While contemporary artists often look back on Surrealism as a deeply impactful revolution of thought in art, not everyone agrees with the praise it is given. At its consummation, Surrealism was viewed by many in the art world as the pseudo-intellectual creations of anarchic men. “In 1925, there were few indeed who saw in it anything more than a return to infantilism and nihilism” (Peyre). By the 1940s some surrealists themselves viewed the movement in a negative light, including poet Louis Aragon. Author Anna Balakian states that:

The surrealist movement of the 1920s-1930s was largely based on the notion that excessive rational thought is a catalyst of conflict and war throughout the world. Salvador Dali’s The Persistence

Frida Kahlo, she never intended to become a painter. Kahlo was aspired to become a doctor as a young woman, but after a horrible accident at the age of 18, it left her mentally, as well as physically scared for life. This event had totally changed her life forever. The theme in almost all of Frida’s painting was her own life. Her paintings were based on events took place during her lifetime. As we can see in many of Frida’s paintings, especially in her self-portraits, it expresses her own personal emotions along with feelings about an event that happened in her life, such as her physical condition, her lack of ability to conceive children of her own, her ideology of life and nature, and most important of all, it was her unstable relationship with her husband Diego. Somewhere between the movement of surrealism, realism and symbolism in the art of Frida Kahlo, she was able to bring out tenderness, femininity, reality, cruelty and suffering within her paintings.

Surrealism was one of the most influential artistic movements of the 20th Century. André Breton consolidated Surrealism as a movement in the early 1920s, trying to achieve the “total liberation of the mind and of all that resembles it[1]” through innovative and varied ideas. Surrealism deeply influenced the world in the era between the two world wars and played a big role in the diffusion and adoption of psychology worldwide. Surrealism faded after World War II, but its revolutionary genius has influenced every artistic movement ever since.

These changes sculpted people to be less formal than they were. Surrealism was a major part of art in the 1920s. People used surrealism to express their selves. Salvador Dali is a major surreal artist and is mostly known for his painting The Persistence of Memory. Artists used their work to show their ideas.

Andre Breton founded the Surrealist movement in 1924 with his Manifesto of Surrealism which argued that art can benefit from an understanding of the Freudian dreamscape. His definitions of Surrealism were, “Dictionary: Surrealism, n. Pure psychic automatism, by which one proposes to express, either verbally, in writing, or by any other manner, the real functioning of thought. Dictation of thought in the absence of all control exercised by reason, outside of all aesthetic and moral preoccupation. Encyclopedia: Surrealism. Philosophy. Surrealism is based on the belief in the superior reality of certain forms of previously neglected associations, in the omnipotence of dream, in the disinterested play of thought. It tends to ruin once and for all other psychic mechanisms and to substitute itself for them in solving all the principal problems of life” (Breton, 1924).

Non-conformist to traditional art forms, Conceptualism challenges the viewer to delve into the mindset of the artist. It is often seen as multidimensional as it forces the audience to decipher the artists intentions. This art movement has been completely rejecting the standard ideas of art since the mid-1960’s. Since then, many artists have made a name for themselves by self-consciously expanding the boundaries of art. Many of these artists have said they’ve linked their work to artist Marcel Duchamp.

Surrealism is a movement in art and literature that occurred in the 20th century which influenced the incorporation of fact and fantasy in a piece. Tim O’ Brien uses surrealism in The Things They Carried to show how many war stories incorporate this idea of false and factual stories combined. He says that many of the things that occur on a daily basis are stories that are made up and the stories that no one believes are the ones that actually happen. The idea behind surrealism is to tap into the potential of the human mind. This incorporation of surrealism helps to enhance the plot of the book.

Though some may view Abstract Expressionism and Surrealism as similar, the thing that made it fundamentally different, according to Motherwell, was that the artists worked more `directly' and `violently' and on a `much larger scale physically than the surrealists ever had.' (Page 40, David and Cecil) It also seems important to Motherwell to have a style that

Most of us connect surrealism with art and images from Dali and his generation. However, the artists of the surrealist movement regard their work as an expression of the original philosophical movement with the works being an artefact that philosophy. André Breton was clearly in his view that surrealism was above all, a revolutionary and radical philosophical movement, explaining that is not a matter of aesthetics, but rather a way of thinking, a point of view (Waldberg 1997; Pass 2011:29-30).