By: Rita Szalai
I think we all know the famous painting that reads “Ceci n’est pas une pipe” by Magritte, but do you know what art movement it belongs to?
Let me set the scene: it’s the end of World War I. Artists are sick and tired of the horrifying reality they are confronted with every single day. It was then that they decided to create a movement called Surrealism, which joined together the real world, and the obscure world of dreams.
The Surrealist movement’s objective
“Surrealism is based on the belief in the omnipotence of dreams, in the undirected play of thought.” – André Breton
The term “surrealism” literally means “beyond reality”. While the term existed earlier, the movement was created in the 1920s by André Breton in Paris, who wanted to merge the dream world together with reality. Surrealist artists, inspired by the rise of psychoanalysis (think Sigmund Freud) wanted to tap into their unconscious, as they thought that it was the source of creativity and imagination. They believed that dreams were particularly important as they allowed the unconscious mind to express itself, and not only for the artist. They wanted to awaken something in the viewer to connect with them on a deeper level than ever before. In short, art became more than just something visually pleasing to hang up as decoration around the house. Surrealism also went hand in hand with radicalism and communism, as it was all about breaking free of the oppressive boundaries of rational thought and individualism established after the Enlightenment.
The movement’s characteristics
Surrealists used a process called automatism to create artworks, a process that was quite experimental and specific to each artist. They would follow their intuition as they painted, similarly to how you would take a test if you hadn’t studied for it. Others created art by distorting reality as they knew it, removing objects from the ordinary context they existed in and rearranging them in peculiar ways. One of the reasons why this movement is hard to define is that it was completely free: it wasn’t restricted to a specific medium or style. Artists were allowed to do whatever they wanted, whether that was painting a collection of seemingly random objects or writing witty world plays with pictures.
Surrealist artists and their works
The Great Masturbator (1929) by Salvador Dalí
This painting is a great example of surrealism, as it is very clearly inspired by Freud’s psychanalytic theory, with various objects of sexual nature depicted in disarray. It is a weird kind of self-portrait, where the artist paints his own anxieties and fears. He had just met his future wife, Gala Dalí, who was married to his friend Paul Eluard (who was a surrealist poet, so she clearly had a type). The painting both represents the hidden desire that was consuming his mind and his lifelong phobia of insects.
The Great Masturbator, Dali, accreditation: Zalium, Jack. “The Great Masturbator”, March 2012, via flickr.com. CC BY-NC 2.0
An Andalusian Dog (1929) by Luis Buñuel and Dalí
Surrealism also found its place in cinema, this movie being one of the earliest works. It was inspired by the two artists’ dreams and in consequence portrays a dream-like reality that isn’t subject to time or logic. It also aims to provoke a response in the viewer, wether that be emotionally or physically by showing disturbing and gory images such as brutal murders and carcasses. Funnily enough, Buñuel wished to shock the French bourgeoisie, who valued rationality and aesthetic, but achieved the opposite as the audience ended up liking it.
Object (1936) by Meret Oppenheim
This paradoxical sculpture embodies key elements of the surrealist movement. It uses household objects, in this case a teacup, saucer and spoon but adds a completely unexpected twist to them. In this particular scene, the everyday objects covered with fur become sexual symbols and emphasise the contradiction between civilisation and wilderness. Women surrealists are also representative of a bigger struggle. Not only their struggle against their restricting roles as either male artists’ muses or as sex objects, but also against the patriarchy.
Object by Meret Oppenheim, accreditation : Hagen, Havard. “Object, Meret Oppenheim”, February 2015, via flickr.com, CC BY-NC-SA 2.0
How it changed art history
With the rise of nazism in Europe, many surrealist artists fled to various continents and spread the movement, both on an artistic and political level. Revolution is at the heart of the Surrealism, as its principle is to liberate people from a society full of conventions and rules and be in tune with their subconscious, freeing their imagination. There is no doubt a spiritual aspect to this movement: it blurs the lines between the psychological and mystical, trying to find the roots of the way we behave through spontaneity. The impact of the surrealist movement was immense, and it was not confined to art; it inspired people to question everything they thought they knew, which was the first step towards change.
