SurrealismSurrealism

Exploring the Unconscious

Rene MagritteRene Magritte

Rene MagritteRene Magritte

Belgian Artist He juxtaposed everyday objects

with familiar settings to create surreal compositions.

Themes included hidden or shrouded faces

and a man in a bowler hat- self portrait.Subtle elements of surrealism

Joan MiroJoan Miro

Created unique biomorphic designs like the sun, moon and animals.

Forms progressively simplified to a visual shorthand of the artist.

Seemed like cartoons from another planet.

He wanted”to express with precision all of the golden sparks the soul gives off.”

Joan MiroJoan Miro

Max ErnstMax Ernst

Worked from memories and images from childhood.

Related back to feverish visions of childhood and tried to recreate them for art’s sake.

Invented ”frottage” or rubbings from rough surfaces that he would work into to create fantastic or monstrous imagery.

Max ErnstMax Ernst

“Frottage is nothing but a technical medium, in order to increase the hallucinatory abilities of the spirit, to awake visions automatically and to get rid of one’s blindness.”

Marc Chagall

Marc ChagallMarc Chagall

Precursor to SurrealismUsed imagery from Russian

folklore and Jewish life.Insisted that he painted actual

memories , not irrational dreams.

Marcel DuchampMarcel DuchampA prime mover of Surrealism and

Dadaism.Dadaism was a movement in art

that protested the madness of war.The aim of the dadaists was to

cultivate the absurd.Wanted to awaken the imagination.Created ready-mades that lead to

the question- What is art?

Is This Art?

Georgio De ChiricoGeorgio De Chirico

Painted nightmare fantasies 15 years before the Surrealists existed.

Eerie cityscapes with dramatic light and ominous shadows.

Depersonalized figures to create the feeling of menace.

Skewed use of perspective to illustrate irrational childhood fears.

De Chirico

De Chirico