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Surrealism

Surrealism is a cultural movement that began in the early 1920s, and is best known for its visual artworks and writingsSurrealist works feature the element of surprise, unexpected juxtapositions and non sequitur; however, many Surrealist artists and writers regard their work as an expression of the philosophical movement first and foremost, with the works being an artifact Leader Andri Breton was explicit in his assertion that Surrealism was above all a revolutionary movementSurrealism developed out of the Dada activities during World War I and the most important center of the movement was Paris From the 1920s onward, the movement spread around the globe, eventually affecting the visual arts, literature, film, and music of many countries and languages, as well as political thought and practice, philosophy, and social theoryThe word surrealist was coined by Guillaume Apollinaire and first appeared in the preface to his play Les Mamelles de Tirisias, which was written in 1903 and first performed in 1917World War I scattered the writers and artists who had been based in Paris, and in the interim many became involved with Dada, believing that excessive rational thought and bourgeois values had brought the conflict of the war upon the world The Dadaists protested with anti-art gatherings, performances, writings and art works After the war, when they returned to Paris, the Dada activities continuedDuring the war, Andri Breton, who had trained in medicine and psychiatry, served in a neurological hospital where he used Sigmund Freud's psychoanalytic methods with soldiers suffering from shell-shock Meeting the young writer Jacques Vachi, Breton felt that Vachi was the spiritual son of writer and pataphysics founder Alfred Jarry He admired the young writer's anti-social attitude and disdain for established artistic tradition Later Breton wrote, "In literature, I was successively taken with Rimbaud, with Jarry, with Apollinaire, with Nouveau, with Lautriamont, but it is Jacques Vachi to whom I owe the most"[1]Back in Paris, Breton joined in Dada activities and started the literary journal Littirature along with Louis Aragon and Philippe Soupault They began experimenting with automatic writingspontaneously writing without censoring their thoughtsand published the writings, as well as accounts of dreams, in the magazine Breton and Soupault delved deeper into automatism and wrote The Magnetic Fields (1920)Continuing to write, they attracted more artists and writers; they came to believe that automatism was a better tactic for societal change than the Dada attack on prevailing values The group grew to include Paul iluard, Benjamin Piret, Reni Crevel, Robert Desnos, Jacques Baron, Max Morise,[2] Pierre Naville, Roger Vitrac, Gala iluard, Max Ernst, Salvador Dali, Man Ray, Hans Arp, Georges Malkine, Michel Leiris, Georges Limbour, Antonin Artaud, Raymond Queneau, Andri Masson, Joan Miro, Marcel Duchamp, Jacques Privert, and Yves Tanguy[3]As they developed their philosophy, they believed that Surrealism would advocate the idea that ordinary and depictive expressions are vital and important, but that the sense of their arrangement must be open to the full range of imagination according to the Hegelian Dialectic They also looked to the Marxist dialectic and the work of such theorists as Walter Benjamin and Herbert MarcuseFreud's work with free association, dream analysis, and the unconscious was of utmost importance to the Surrealists in developing methods to liberate imagination They embraced idiosyncrasy, while rejecting the idea of an underlying madness Later, Salvador Dali explained it as: "There is only one difference between a madman and me I am not mad"[2]Beside the use of dream analysis, they emphasized that "one could combine inside the same frame, elements not normally found together to produce illogical and startling effects"[4] Breton included the idea of the startling juxtapositions in his 1924 manifesto, taking it in turn from a 1918 essay by poet Pierre Reverdy, which said: "a juxtaposition of two more or less distant realities The more the relationship between the two juxtaposed realities is distant and true, the stronger the image will be -- the greater its emotional power and poetic reality"[5]The group aimed to revolutionize human experience, in its personal, cultural, social, and political aspects They wanted to free people from false rationality, and restrictive customs and structures Breton proclaimed that the true aim of Surrealism was "long live the social revolution, and it alone" To this goal, at various times Surrealists aligned with communism and anarchismIn 1924 they declared their philosophy in the first "Surrealist Manifesto" That same year they established the Bureau of Surrealist Research, and began publishing the journal La Rivolution surrialisteBreton wrote the manifesto of 1924 that defines the purposes of the group He included citations of the influences on Surrealism, examples of Surrealist works and discussion of Surrealist automatism He defined Surrealism as:Shortly after releasing the first Surrealist Manifesto, the Surrealists published the inaugural issue of La Rivolution surrialiste Publication continued into 1929 As the first directors, Naville and Piret modeled the format of the journal on the conservative scientific review La Nature To the Surrealists' delight, the journal was consistently scandalous and revolutionary While the focus was on writing, the journal also included reproductions of art, among them works by Giorgio de Chirico, Ernst, Masson, and Man RayThe Bureau of Surrealist Research (Centrale Surrialiste) was the center for Surrealist writers and artists to meet, hold discussions, and conduct interviews They investigated speech under tranceThe movement in the mid-1920s was characterized by meetings in cafes where the Surrealists played collaborative drawing games, discussed the theories of Surrealism, and developed a variety of techniques such as automatic drawing Breton initially doubted that visual arts could even be useful in the Surrealist movement since they appeared to be less malleable and open to chance and automatism This caution was overcome by the discovery of such techniques as frottage and decalcomania

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Soon more visual artists became involved, including Giorgio de Chirico, Max Ernst, Joan Miro, Francis Picabia, Yves Tanguy, Salvador Dali, Luis Buiuel, Alberto Giacometti, Valentine Hugo, Miret Oppenheim, Toyen, and later after the second war: Enrico Donati Though Breton admired Pablo Picasso and Marcel Duchamp and courted them to join the movement, they remained peripheral[6] More writers also joined, including former Dadaist Tristan Tzara, Reni Char, and Georges Sadoul


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Surrealism - Oil Paintings Art Gallery Maria D'Adam