Surrealism
 Surrealism
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.
Surrealism
French
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/Psychology
The
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/Psychology
In
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.
Summary
 Early
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 selfportrait. The single figure who stands in
adoration is believed to be that of his
wife, Gala (who often appeared in his
paintings).