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Il '''surrealismo''' è un movimento intellettuale, che ha coinvolto [[arte|arti visive]], [[letteratura]] e [[cinema]], nato negli anni 1920 a [[Parigi]]. La caratteristica comune a tutte manifestazioni surrealiste è la critica radicale alla razionalità cosciente, e la liberazione delle potenzialità immaginative dell'[[inconscio]] per il raggiungimento di uno stato conoscitivo "oltre" la realtà (''sur-realtà'').
La fede surrealista si manifestò spesso come ribellione alle convenzioni culturali e sociali, concepita come una trasformazione totale della vita, attraverso la libertà di costumi, la poesia e l'amore. Spesso, molti esponenti del surrealismo sposarono la causa del [[comunismo]] e dell'[[anarchismo]], per contribuire attivamente il cambiamento politico e sociale che avrebbe poi portato ad una partecipazone più generale alla ''surrealtà''.
Il movimento ebbe come principale teorico il poeta André Breton, che canalizzò la vitalità distruttiva del dadaismo. Nel primo [[Manifesto surrealista]] del [[1924]], definì così il surrealismo:
{{quote|Automatismo psichico puro, attraverso il quale ci si propone di esprimere, con le parole o la scrittura o in altro modo, il reale funzionamento del pensiero. Comando del pensiero, in assenza di qualsiasi controllo esercitato dalla ragione, al di fuori di ogni preoccupazione estetica e morale.}}
<!--==Philosophy==
Surrealist philosophy emerged around [[1920]], partly as an outgrowth of [[Dada]], with French writer [[André Breton]] as its initial principal theorist.
In Breton's [[Surrealist Manifesto]] of [[1924]] he defines Surrealism as:
:'' '''Dictionary''': Surrealism, n.
:'' '''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 would later qualify the first of these definitions by saying "in the absence of ''conscious'' moral or aesthetic self-censorship", and by his admission, through subsequent developments, that these definitions were capable of considerable expansion.
Like those involved in Dada, adherents of Surrealism thought that the horrors of [[World War I]] were the culmination of the [[Industrial Revolution]] and the result of the rational mind. Consequently, irrational thought and dream-states were seen as the natural antidote to those social problems.
While [[Dada]] rejected categories and labels and was rooted in negative response to the [[World War I|First World War]], Surrealism advocates 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 [[Dialectic#Hegelian dialectic|Hegelian Dialectic]]. The Marxist dialectic and other theories, such as [[Freud]]ian theory, also played a significant role in some of the development of surrealist theory and, as in the work of such theorists as [[Walter Benjamin]] and [[Herbert Marcuse]], surrealism contributed to the development of Marxian theory itself.
The Surrealist diagnosis of the "problem" of the [[realism (arts)|realism]] and [[capitalism|capitalist]] civilization is a restrictive overlay of false rationality, including social and academic convention, on the free functioning of the instinctual urges of the human mind.
Surrealist philosophy connects with the theories of psychiatrist [[Sigmund Freud]]. Freud asserted that [[unconscious mind|unconscious]] thoughts (the thoughts of which one is not aware) motivate human behavior, and he advocated [[free association]] (uncensored expression) and [[dream analysis]] to reveal unconscious thoughts.
It is through the practice of automatism, dream interpretation, and numerous other surrealist methods that Surrealists believe the wellspring of imagination and creativity can be accessed.
Surrealism also embraces [[idiosyncrasy]], while rejecting the idea of an underlying madness or darkness of the mind. [[Salvador Dalí]], who is considered to have been quite idiosyncratic, explained it as "The only difference between myself and a madman is I am not MAD!"
Surrealists look to so-called "[[Primitivism (art)|primitive art]]" as an example of expression that is not self-censored.
The radical aim of Surrealism is to revolutionize human experience, including its personal, cultural, social, and political aspects, by freeing people from what is seen as false rationality, and restrictive customs and structures. As [[André Breton|Breton]] proclaimed, the true aim of Surrealism is "long live the social revolution, and it alone!".
To this goal, at various times Surrealists have aligned with [[Communism|communism]] and [[Anarchism|anarchism]].
Not all Surrealists subscribe to all facets of the philosophy. Historically many were not interested in political matters, and this lack of interest created rifts in the Surrealism movement.
By the turn of the 21st century, Surrealist philosophy varied amongst Surrealist groups around the globe. Some Surrealist theorists have stated that Surrealism has somehow "gone beyond" or "superseded" philosophy, or that philosophy has been "outclassed" by Surrealism.
== History of Surrealism==
[[Image:La Revolution Surrealiste cover.jpg|thumb|right|Cover of the first issue of ''[[La Révolution surréaliste]]'', December 1924.]] <!--this capitalization of the title seems to be the standard-->
In 1917, [[Guillaume Apollinaire]] coined the term "surrealism" in the program notes describing the ballet ''[[Parade (ballet)|Parade]]'' which was a collaborative work by [[Jean Cocteau]], [[Erik Satie]], [[Pablo Picasso]] and [[Léonide Massine]]:
:''From this new alliance, for until now stage sets and costumes on one side and choreography on the other had only a sham bond between them, there has come about, in 'Parade', a kind of super-realism ('sur-réalisme'), in which I see the starting point of a series of manifestations of this new spirit ('esprit nouveau').'
The Surrealist movement mainly originated in the [[Dada]] movement. While the movement's most important center was Paris, it spread throughout Europe and to North America, [[Japan]] and the Caribbean during the course of the [[1920s]], [[1930s]] and [[1940s]], by the [[1960s]] to [[Africa]], [[South America]] and much of [[Asia]] and by the [[1980s]] to [[Australia]]. There have even been some manifestations of surrealism in [[Russia]] and [[China]]. Some historians mark the end of the movement at [[World War II]], some with the death of [[André Breton]], some with the death of [[Salvador Dalí]], while others believe that Surrealism continues as an identifiable movement.
=== Split from Dada ===
Breton's [[Surrealist Manifesto]] of [[1924]] and the publication of the magazine ''[[La Révolution surréaliste]]'' (''The Surrealist Revolution'') marked the split from the more [[Dada]] oriented Surrealists centred round [[Tristan Tzara]].
Five years earlier, Breton and [[Philippe Soupault]] wrote the first "[[Surrealist automatism|automatic book]]" (spontaneously written), ''[[Les Champs Magnétiques]]''. By December of 1924, the publication ''[[La Révolution surréaliste]]'' edited by [[Pierre Naville]] and [[Benjamin Péret]] and later by Breton, was started. Also, a [[Bureau of Surrealist Research]] began in Paris and was at one time, under the direction of [[Antonin Artaud]].
In 1926, [[Louis Aragon]] wrote ''[[Le Paysan de Paris]]'', following the appearance of many Surrealist books, poems, pamphlets, automatic texts and theoretical works published by the Surrealists, including those by [[René Crevel]].
Many of the popular artists in [[Paris]] throughout the [[1920s]] and [[1930s]] were Surrealists, including [[René Magritte]], [[Joan Miró]], [[Max Ernst]], [[Salvador Dalí]], [[Alberto Giacometti]], [[Valentine Hugo]], [[Méret Oppenheim]], [[Man Ray]], [[Toyen]] and [[Yves Tanguy]]. Though Breton adored [[Pablo Picasso]] and [[Marcel Duchamp]] and courted them to join the movement, they did not join.
The Surrealists developed [[Surrealist techniques|techniques]] such as [[automatic drawing]] (developed by [[André Masson]]), [[automatic painting]], [[decalcomania]], [[Frottage (surrealist technique)|Frottage]], [[Surrealist techniques#Fumage|fumage]], [[Surrealist techniques#Grattage|grattage]] and [[Surrealist techniques#Parsemage|parsemage]] that became significant parts of Surrealist practice. ([[Automatism and the computer|Automatism]] was later adapted to the computer.) [[Surrealist games|Games]] such as the [[exquisite corpse]] also assumed a great importance in Surrealism.
Although sometimes considered exclusively French, Surrealism was international from the beginning, with both the Belgian and [[Czech and Slovak Surrealist Group|Czech groups]] developing early; the Czech group continues uninterrupted to this day. Some of what have been described as the most significant [[Surrealist theory|Surrealist theorists]] such as [[Karel Teige]] from Czechoslovakia, [[Shuzo Takiguchi]] from Japan, [[Octavio Paz]] from Mexico, also [[Aimé Césaire]] and [[René Menil]] from Martinique, who both started the Surrealist journal ''[[Tropiques]]'' in 1940, have hailed from other countries. The most radical of Surrealist methods have also originated in countries other than France, for example, the technique of [[Surrealist techniques#Cubomania|cubomania]] was invented by Romanian Surrealist [[Gherasim Luca]].
=== Interwar Surrealism: Centrality of Breton ===
[[Image:Breton eluard.gif|thumb|right|200px|[[Paul Éluard]] and [[André Breton]]. ([[Man Ray]]. Private collection.)]]
Breton, as the leader of the Surrealist movement, not only published its most thorough explanations of its techniques, aims and ideas, but was the individual who drew in, and expelled, writers, artists and thinkers. Through the interwar period he formed the focus of Surrealist activity in Paris, and his writings were enormously influential in spreading Surrealism as a body of thought, in such works ''Nadja'' ([[1928]]), the ''Second Surrealist Manifesto'' ([[1930]]), ''Communicating Vessels'' ([[1932]]), and ''Mad Love'' ([[1937]]).
To further the revolutionary aim of Surrealism, in 1927 [[André Breton|Breton]] and others joined the [[Communist Party]]. Breton was ousted from the Party in 1933.
The late 1920s were turbulent for the group as several individuals closely associated with Breton left, and several prominent artists entered.
Surrealism continued to expand in public visibility. The high water mark, in Breton's own estimation, was the 1936 [[London International Surrealist Exhibition]].
In 1937, Breton (on visit to Mexico) and [[Leon Trotsky]] co-authored a ''[[Manifesto for an independent revolutionary art]]''[http://www.marxists.org/subject/art/lit_crit/works/rivera/manifesto.htm] on the need for a permanent revolution, and attacked [[Stalinism]] and [[Socialist realism]], as the "negation of freedom".
Surrealism also attracted writers from the United Kingdom to Paris including [[David Gascoyne]], who became friends with [[Paul Éluard]] and [[Max Ernst]], and translated [[André Breton|Breton]] and [[Salvador Dalí|Dalí]] into English. In 1935 he authored ''A Short Study of Surrealism'', and then returned to England during the World War II, where he roomed with [[Lucian Freud]] and continued to write in the Surrealist style for the remainder of his life.
[[Acéphale]] was one splinter group that formed (mid-1930s). The group was comprised of some of those disaffected by Breton's increasing rigidity, and structured as a "secret society". Led by [[Georges Bataille|Bataille]], they published ''Da Costa Encyclopedia'' meant to coincide with the [[1947]] Surrealist exhibition in Paris.
=== Surrealism during World War II ===
The rise of [[Adolf Hitler]] and the events of 1939 through 1945 in Europe, for a time overshadowed almost all else. However, after the war, Breton continued to write and espouse the importance of liberating of the human mind. For example in ''The Tower of Light'' in ([[1952]]).
In [[1941]], Breton went to the United States, where he founded the short lived magazine ''[[VVV]]'', which boasted high production values and a great deal of content. However, its content was increasingly in French, not English. It was American poet [[Charles Henri Ford]] and his magazine ''[[View (magazine)|View]]'' which offered Breton a channel for promoting Surrealism in the United States. Ford and Breton had an on/off relationship. Breton felt that Ford should work more specifically for Surrealism and Ford, for his part, resented what he felt to be Breton's attempts to make him "toe the line". Nevertheless, ''View'' published an interview between Breton and [[Nicolas Calas]], as well as special issues on [[Yves Tanguy|Tanguy]] and [[Max Ernst|Ernst]] and in [[1945]], on Marcel Duchamp.
The ''[[View (magazine)|View]]'' special issue on Duchamp was crucial for the public understanding of Surrealism in America. It stressed his connections to Surrealist methods, offered interpretations of his work by Breton, as well as Breton's view that Duchamp represented the bridge between early modern movements, such as [[Futurism]] and [[Cubism]], to Surrealism.
Breton's return to France after the Second World War, began a new phase of surrealist activity in Paris, one which attracted considerable attention. Membership in the Paris Surrealist Group and interest in it, climbed to above pre-war levels.
Breton's critiques of [[rationalism]] and [[dualism]], found a new audience after the Second World War, as his argument that returning to old patterns of behavior would ensure a repeated cycle of conflict seemed increasingly prophetic to French intellectuals while the [[Cold War]] mounted. Breton's insistence that Surrealism was not an aesthetic movement, nor a series of techniques and tools, but instead the means for ongoing revolt against the reduction of humanity to market relationships, religious gestures and misery, meant that his ideas and stances were taken up by many, even those who had never heard of Breton, or read any of his work. The importance of living Surrealism was repeated by Breton and by those writing about him.
=== Post World War II Surrealism===
There is no clear consensus about the end of the Surrealist movement: some historians suggest that the movement was effectively disbanded by WWII, others treat the movement as extending through the [[1950s]]. In 1959, [[Andre Breton]] organized an exhibiton in [[Spain]] called ''The Homage to Surrealism'' to celebrate the Fortieth Anniversary of Surrealism which exhibited works by [[Salvador Dalí]], [[Joan Miró]], [[Enrique Tábara]], and [[Eugenio Granell]]. Art historian [[Sarane Alexandrian]] ([[1970]]) states, "the death of André Breton in [[1966]] marked the end of Surrealism as an organized movement." However, some who knew Breton, and were part of groups he founded or approved have continued to be active well after his death. For example, the Czech Surrealist Group in Prague, though driven underground in [[1968]], re-emerged in the [[1990s]]; and in [[1976]] the largest-ever exhibition of international surrealism, the World Surrealist Exhibition, went up in Chicago. Still other groups and artists, not directly connected to Breton, have claimed the Surrealist label.
'''People involved in the (first) Paris Surrealist Group'''
*[[Louis Aragon]]
*[[Jean Arp]]
*[[Georges Bataille]]
*[[André Breton]]
*[[Luis Bunuel]]
*[[Claude Cahun]]
*[[Giorgio de Chirico]]
*[[Jean Cocteau]]
*[[René Crevel]]
*[[Salvador Dalí]]
*[[René Daumal]]
*[[Lise Deharme]]
*[[Robert Desnos]]
*[[Paul Éluard]]
*[[Max Ernst]]
*[[David Gascoyne]]
*[[Alberto Giacometti]]
*[[Valentine Hugo]]
*[[Michel Leiris]]
*[[René Magritte]]
*[[Roberto Matta]]
*[[Joan Miró]]
*[[André Masson]]
*[[Pierre Naville]]
*[[Méret Oppenheim]]
*[[Benjamin Péret]]
*[[Jacques Prévert]]
*[[Raymond Queneau]]
*[[Man Ray]]
*[[Philippe Soupault]]
*[[Tristan Tzara]]
*[[Yves Tanguy]]
*[[Toyen]]
*[[Remedios Varo]]
*[[Nancy Cunard]]
*[[André Thirion]]
*[[René Char]]
== Surrealism in the arts ==
In general usage, the term Surrealism is more often considered a movement in [[visual arts]] than the original cultural and philosophical movement. As with some other movements that had both philosophical and artistic dimensions, such as [[Romanticism|romanticism]] and [[Minimalism|minimalism]], the relationship between the two usages is complex and a matter of some debate outside the movement. Many Surrealist artists regarded their work as an expression of the philosophical movement first and foremost, and [[André Breton|Breton]] was explicit in his belief that Surrealism was above all a revolutionary movement. In addition, many surrealists and surrealist documents have declared that surrealism is not an [[art movement|artistic movement]] for a number of additional reasons, among which is the conception of the "artistic" manifestations of surrealism as just one form of manifestation among many, various conceptions of visual work being created which somehow "goes beyond" traditional conceptions of art or [[aesthetics]], or even the complete cessation of creative visual production. In addition, the art object/product - while an important part of the Surrealist process - is viewed as merely a "souvenir" of a vastly more critical journey, interesting only in so far as it is revelatory of that adventure.
=== Surrealism in visual arts ===
'''Early visual arts Surrealism'''
Since so many of the artists involved in Surrealism came from the [[Dada]] movement, the demarcation between Surrealist and Dadaist art, as with the demarcation between Surrealism and [[Dada]] in general, is a line drawn differently by different scholars.
The roots of Surrealism in the visual arts run to both [[Dada]] and [[Cubism]], as well as the abstraction of [[Wassily Kandinsky]] and [[Expressionism]], as well as [[Post-Impressionism]]. However, it was not the particulars of technique which marked the Surrealist movement in the visual arts, but an the creation of objects from the imagination, from automatism, or from a number of [[Surrealist techniques]].
[[Image:MagrittePipe.jpg|thumb|left|200px|[[René Magritte]]'s "The Betrayal of Images" (1928-9)]]
[[André Masson|Masson]]'s [[automatic drawing]]s of [[1923]], are often used as a convenient point of difference, since these reflect the influence of the idea of the [[unconscious mind]].
Another example is Alberto Giacometti's [[1925]] ''Torso'', which marked his movement to simplified forms and inspiration from pre-classical sculpture. However, a striking example of the line used to divide Dada and Surrealism among art experts is the pairing of [[1925]]'s ''[[Von minimax dadamax selbst konstruiertes maschinchen]]'' with ''[[Le Baiser]]'' from [[1927]] by Max Ernst. The first is generally held to have a distance, and erotic subtext, where as the second presents an erotic act openly and directly. In the second the influence of Miró and Picasso's drawing style is visible with the use of fluid curving and intersecting lines and colour, where as the first takes a directness that would later be influential in movements such as [[Pop art]].
[[Giorgio de Chirico]] was one of the important joining figures between the philosophical and visual aspects of Surrealism. Between [[1911]] and [[1917]], he adopted a very primary colour palette, and unornamented epictional style whose surface would be adopted by others later. ''La tour rouge'' from [[1913]] shows the stark colour contrasts and illustrative style later adopted by Surrealist painters. His [[1914]] ''La Nostalgie du poete'' has the figure turned away from the viewer, and the juxtaposition of a bust with glasses and a fish as a relief which defies conventional realistic explanation. He was also a writer. His novel ''[[Hebdomeros]]'' presents a series of dreamscapes, with an unusual use of punctuation, syntax and grammar, designed to create a particular atmosphere and frame around its images. His images, including set designs for the [[Ballet Russe]], would create a decorative form of visual Surrealism, and he would be an influence on the two that would be even more closely associated with Surrealism in the public mind: [[Salvador Dalí|Dalí]] and [[Magritte]].
In [[1924]], [[Joan Miró|Miro]] and [[André Masson|Masson]] applied Surrealism theory to painting explicitly leading to the ''La Peinture Surrealiste'' Exposition at Gallerie Pierre in [[1925]], which included work by [[Man Ray]], Masson, Klee and Miró among others. It confirmed that Surrealism had a component in the visual arts (though it had been initially debated whether this was possible), techniques from Dada, such as [[photomontage]] were used.
[[Galerie Surréaliste]] opened on [[March 26]], [[1926]] with an exhibition by [[Man Ray]].
Breton published ''Surrealism and Painting'' in [[1928]] which summarized the movement to that point, though he continued to update the work until the [[1960s]].
'''1930s'''
[[Image:The Persistence of Memory.jpg|thumb|240px|[[Salvador Dalí]]. ''[[The Persistence of Memory]]''. 1931.]]
[[Dalí]] and [[Magritte]] created the most widely recognized images of the movement. Dalí joined the group in [[1929]], and participated in the rapid establishment of the visual style between [[1930]] and [[1935]].
Surrealism as a visual movement had found a method: to expose psychological truth by stripping ordinary objects of their normal significance, in order to create a compelling image that was beyond ordinary formal organization, in order to evoke empathy from the viewer.
[[1931]] marked a year when several Surrealist painters produced works which marked turning points in their stylistic evolution: Magritte's ''[[La Voix des airs]]'' is an example of this process, where three large spheres representing bells hanging above a landscape. Another Surrealist landscape from this same year is [[Yves Tanguy|Tanguy]]'s ''[[Palais promontoire]]'', with its molten forms and liquid shapes. Liquid shapes became the trademark of Dalí, particularly in his ''[[The Persistence of Memory]]'', which features the image of clocks that sag as if they are made out of cloth.
The characteristics of this style: a combination of the depictive, the abstract, and the psychological, came to stand for the alienation which many people felt in the [[Modernism|modern]] period, combined with the sense of reaching more deeply into the psyche, to be "made whole with ones individuality".
Long after personal, political and professional tensions broke up the Surrealist group, Magritte and Dalí continued to define a visual program in the arts. This program reached beyond painting, to encompass photography as well, as can be seen from a Man Ray self portrait, whose use of assemblage influenced [[Robert Rauschenberg]]'s collage boxes.
During the [[1930s]] [[Peggy Guggenheim]], an important art collector married [[Max Ernst]] and began promoting work by other Surrealists such as [[Yves Tanguy]] and the British artist [[John Tunnard]]. However, by the outbreak of the [[Second World War]], the taste of the [[avant-garde]] swung decisively towards [[Abstract Expressionism]] with the support of key taste makers, including Guggenheim. However, it should not be easily forgotten that Abstract Expressionism itself grew directly out of the meeting of American (particularly New York) artists with European Surrealists self-exiled during WWII. In particular, [[Arshile Gorky]] influenced the development of this American art form, which - as Surrealism did - celebrated the instantaneous human act as the well-spring of creativity. The early work of many Abstract Expressionists reveals a tight bond between the more superficial aspects of both movements, and the emergence (at a later date) of aspects of Dadaistic humor in such artists as Rauschenberg sheds an even starker light upon the connection. Up until the emergence of Pop Art, Surrealism can be seen to have been the single most important influence on the sudden growth in American arts, and even in Pop, some of the humor manifested in Surrealism can be found, often turned to a cultural criticism.
'''World War II and beyond'''
[[Image:ElleLogeLaFolie_1970.jpg|thumb|400px|right|[[Roberto Matta]]. ''Elle Loge La Folie'', oil on canvas, 1970.]]
As with many artistic movements in Europe, the coming of the Second World War proved disruptive: both because of the rift between [[André Breton|Breton]] and [[Salvador Dalí|Dalí]] over Dalí's support for [[Francisco Franco]], and because of a diaspora of the members of the Surrealist movement itself. Dalí said to remain a Surrealist forever was like "painting only eyes and noses", and declared he had embarked on a "classic" period; [[Max Ernst]] in [[1962]] said "I feel more affinity for some German Romantics". [[Magritte]] began painting what he called his "solar" or "[[Renoir]]" style.
The works continued. Many Surrealist artists continued to explore their vocabularies, including Magritte. Many members of the Surrealist movement continued to correspond and meet. (In [[1960]], Magritte, Duchamp, Ernst, and Man Ray met in Paris.) While Dalí may have been excommunicated by Breton, he neither abandoned the themes from the [[1930s]], including references to the "persistence of time" in a later painting, nor did he become a depictive "pompier". His classic period did not represent so sharp a break with the past as some descriptions of his work might portray.
During the [[1940s]] Surrealism's influence was also felt in England and America. [[Mark Rothko]] took an interest in bimorphic figures, and in England [[Henry Moore]], [[Lucian Freud]], [[Francis Bacon (painter)|Francis Bacon]] and [[Paul Nash]] used or experimented with Surrealist techniques. However, [[Conroy Maddox]], one of the first British Surrealists, beginning in [[1935]], remained within the movement, organizing an exhibition of current Surrealist work in [[1978]], in response to an exhibition which infuriated him because it did not properly represent Surrealism. The exhibition, titled ''Surrealism Unlimited'' was in Paris, and attracted international attention. He held his last one man show in [[2002]], just before his death in [[2005]].
Magritte's work became more realistic in its depiction of actual objects, while maintaining the element of juxtaposition, such as in [[1951]]'s ''Personal Values'' and [[1954]]'s ''Empire of Light''. Magritte continued to produce works which have entered artistic vocabulary, such as ''Castle in the Pyrenees'' which refers back to ''Voix'' from [[1931]], in its suspension over a landscape.
Other figures from the Surrealist movement were expelled, [[Roberto Matta]] for example, but by their own description "remained close to Surrealism."
Many new artists explicitly took up the Surrealist banner for themselves, some following what they saw as the path of Dalí, others holding to views they derived from Breton. Duchamp continued to produce sculpture and, at his death, was working on an installation with the realistic depiction of a woman viewable only through a peephole. [[Dorothea Tanning]] and [[Louise Bourgeois]] continued to work, for example with Tanning's ''Rainy Day Canape'' from [[1970]].
The [[1960s]] saw an expansion of Surrealism with the founding of [[West Coast Surrealist Group|The West Coast Surrealist Group]] as recognized by Breton's personal assistant [[Jose Pierre]] and also [[Surrealist Movement in the United States]].
That Surrealism has remained commercially successful and popularly recognized has lead many people associated with the Breton's Surrealist group to criticise more general uses of the term. They argue that many self-identified Surrealists are not grounded in Breton's work and the techniques of the movement.
Surrealistic art remains enormously popular with museum patrons. In [[2001]] [[Tate Modern]] held an exhibition of Surrealist art that attracted over 170,000 visitors in its run. Having been one of the most important of movements in the Modern period, Surrealism proceeded to inspire a new generation seeking to expand the vocabulary of art.
===Surrealism in literature===
The first surrealist work, according to Breton, was ''Les Champs Magnétiques'' ([[1921]] “Magnetic Fields”), which was actually a collaboration with the French poet and novelist [[Philippe Soupault]]. But even before that, in [[1919]], [[André Breton|Breton]], [[Soupault]] and [[Aragon]] had already published the magazine ''Littérature'', which contained automatist works and accounts of dreams. The magazine and the portfolio both showed their disdain for literal meanings given to objects and focused rather on the undertones, the poetic undercurrents present. Not only did they give emphasis to the poetic undercurrents, but also to the connotations and the overtones which “exist in ambiguous relationships to the visual images.”
Because surrealist writers seldom (if ever) appear to organize their thoughts and the images they present, some people find much of their work difficult to "parse". This notion however is a superficial comprehension, prompted no doubt by Breton's initial emphasis on automatic writing as the main route toward a higher reality. But - as in Breton's case itself - much of what is presented as purely automatic is actually edited and very "thought out". Breton himself later admitted that automatic writing's centrality had been overstated, and other elements were introduced, especially as the growing involvement of visual artists in the movement forced the issue, since "automatic painting" required a rather more strenuous set of approaches. Thus such elements as collage were introduced, arising partly from an ideal of startling juxtapositions as revealed in Pierre Reverdy's poetry. And - as in Magritte's case (where there is no obvious recourse to either automatic techniques or collage) the very notion of convulsive joining became a tool for revelation in and of itself. Surrealism was meant to be always in flux - to be more modern than modern - and so it was natural there should be a rapid shuffling of the philosophy as new challenges arose.
Surrealists revived interest in [[Isidore Ducasse]], known by his pseudonym “Le Comte de Lautréamont” and for the line “beautiful as the chance meeting on a dissecting table of a sewing machine and an umbrella”, and [[Arthur Rimbaud]], two late [[19th century]] writers believed to be the precursors of Surrealism.
Examples of surrealist literature are [[René Crevel]]'s, ''Mr. Knife Miss Fork'', [[Louis Aragon]]'s, ''Irene's Cunt'', [[André Breton]]'s, ''Sur la route de San Romano'', [[Benjamin Peret]]'s, ''Death to the Pigs'', [[Antonin Artaud]]'s, ''Le Pese-Nerfs''.
===Surrealism in music===
:''Main article: [[Surrealism (music)]].''
In the [[1920s]] several composers were influenced by Surrealism, or by individuals in the Surrealist movement. Among these were [[Bohuslav Martinu]], [[André Souris]], and [[Edgard Varèse]], who stated that his work ''Arcana'' was drawn from a dream sequence. Souris in particular was associated with the movement: he had a long, if sometimes spotty, relationship with [[Magritte]], and worked on [[Paul Nouge]]'s publication ''Adieu Marie''.
French composer [[Pierre Boulez]] wrote a piece called ''explosante-fixe'' (1972), inspired by Breton's ''mad love''.
[[Germaine Tailleferre]] of the French group Les Six wrote several works which could be considered to be inspired by Surrealism, including the 1948 Ballet "Paris-Magie" (scenario by [[Lise Deharme]], who was closely linked to Breton), the Operas "La Petite Sirène" (book by Philippe Soupault) and "Le Maître" (book by Eugène Ionesco). Tailleferre also wrote popular songs to texts by Claude Marci, the wife of Henri Jeanson, whose portrait had been painted by Magritte in the 1930s.
Even though Breton by [[1946]] responded rather negatively to the subject of music with his essay ''Silence is Golden,'' later Surrealists have been interested in - and found parallels to - Surrealism in the improvisation of [[jazz]] (as alluded to above), and the [[blues]] (Surrealists such as [[Paul Garon]] have written articles and full-length books on the subject). Jazz and blues musicians have occasionally reciprocated this interest. For example, the [[1976 World Surrealist Exhibition]] included such performances by [[Honeyboy Edwards]].
Surrealists have also influenced [[reggae]] and, later, [[hip hop music|rap]] and some rock/pop bands such as [[The Psychedelic Furs]]. In addition to musicians who have been influenced by Surrealism (including some influence in rock — the title of the [[1967]] [[psychedelic music|psychedelic]] [[Jefferson Airplane]] album ''[[Surrealistic Pillow]]'' was obviously inspired by the movement), such as the experimental group [[Nurse With Wound]] (whose album title ''Chance meeting on a dissecting table of a sewing machine and umbrella'' is taken from a line in [[Lautreamont]]'s ''Maldoror''). Surrealist music has included such explorations as those of [[Hal Rammel]]. More importantly, the ideas of chance have been used by such modern musical artists as [[David Bowie]] [[Brian Eno]] who - in turn - have sometimes mentioned either [[Dada|Dadaists]] or Surrealists in their work.
===Surrealism in film===
An avant-garde movement in the arts stressing Freudian and Marxist ideas, unconscious elements, irrationalism, and the symbolic association of ideas. Dreamlike and bizarre surrealist movies were produced roughly from 1924 to 1931, primarily in France, though there are still surrealistic elements in the works of many directors.
Surrealist [[film]]s include ''[[Un chien andalou]]'' and ''[[L'Âge d'Or]]'' by [[Luis Buñuel]] and [[Dalí]]. [[Jean Cocteau]] made history in the film world with what is considered to be his surrealist masterpiece, the Orphic Trilogy. These films included The Blood of a Poet (his directoral debut), Orpheus, and Testament of Orpheus (his last film). There is also a strong surrealist influence present in [[Alain Resnais]]'s ''[[Last Year at Marienbad]]''
Surrealist and film theorist [[Robert Benayoun]] has written books on [[Tex Avery]], [[Woody Allen]], [[Buster Keaton]] and the [[Marx Brothers]].
Some have described [[David Lynch]] as a Surrealist filmmaker. He has never participated in the Surrealist movement or in any Surrealist activity, but there are arguably some aspects of many of his films that are of Surrealist interest, although - despite his work's superficial resemblance to many of the Surrealist images - his overall vision tends to be socially conservative, which is not an ideal promoted by Surrealism at large. Much the same problem can be seen in the work of [[David Cronenberg]], whose films - seemingly surreal in their visual components - are often conservative in their content, usually admonishing and punishing those who would go in search of "more reality."
[[Jan Bucquoy]] and [[André Delvaux]] (the latter in the tradition of the ''magic realism'') are the only representatives of the Belgian surrealist school in cinema.
The truest aspects of Surrealism in film are often found in passing frames of a larger film; the sudden emergence of the uncanny into the "normal" which may or may not be further explored in the rest of the film. The original group spent hours going from film to film, often not finishing one before seeking another, partly in hopes of catching just such [[ephemeral]] moments, and partly with the idea of "stitching together" a film in their own minds out of the disparate parts. Such an "[[aesthetic]]" is actually very commonplace today, with countless television stations and the advent of the remote control: people will often skip through the channels looking for that one image which transcends the ordinary.
===Surrealism in television===
Some have found the [[television]] series ''[[The Prisoner]]'' to be of Surrealist interest.
[[Tex Avery]] cartoons originated on film in the 1930s and 1940s, but millions more know his famous characters from Saturday morning cartoons replayed during the 1970s: [[Bugs Bunny]], [[Daffy Duck]], etc.
===Surrealism in politics===
During the 1980s, behind the Iron Curtain, Surrealism entered into the politics, and this thanks to an underground artistic opposition movement known as the [[Orange Alternative]]. The Orange Alternative created in 1981 by [[Waldemar Fydrych]] alias "Major", a graduate of history and art history at the University of [[Wroclaw]], used surrealism symbology and terminology in its large scale happenings organized in the major Polish cities during the [[Jaruzelski]] regime and painted surrealist dwarf graffiti on spots covering up anti-regime slogans. Major himself was the author of the so-called "Manifest of Socialist Surrealism". In this Manifest, he stated that the socialist (communist) system had become so surrealistic that it could be seen as an expression of art itself.
== Impact of Surrealism ==
While Surrealism is typically associated with the arts, it has been said to transcend them; Surrealism has had an impact in many other fields. In this sense, Surrealism does not specifically refer only to self-identified "Surrealists", or those sanctioned by Breton, rather, it refers to a range of creative acts of revolt and efforts to liberate imagination.
In addition to Surrealist ideas that are grounded in the ideas of [[Georg Wilhelm Friedrich Hegel|Hegel]], [[Karl Marx|Marx]] and [[Sigmund Freud|Freud]], surrealism is seen by its advocates as being inherently dynamic and as dialectic in its thought. Surrealists have also drawn on sources as seemingly diverse as [[Clark Ashton Smith]], [[Montague Summers]], [[Fantomas]], [[The Residents]], [[Bugs Bunny]], [[comic strips]], the obscure poet [[Samuel Greenberg]] and the [[hobo]] writer and humourist [[T-Bone Slim]]. One might say that Surrealist strands may be found in movements such as [[Free Jazz]] ([[Don Cherry (jazz)|Don Cherry]], [[Sun Ra]], etc.) and even in the daily lives of people in confrontation with limiting social conditions. Thought of as the effort of humanity to liberate imagination as an act of insurrection against society, surrealism finds precedents in the [[alchemy|alchemists]], possibly [[Dante Alighieri|Dante]], [[Hieronymus Bosch]], [[Donatien Alphonse Francois de Sade|Marquis de Sade]], [[Charles Fourier]], [[Comte de Lautreamont]] and [[Arthur Rimbaud]]. Surrealists believe that ''non-Western'' cultures also provide a continued source of inspiration for Surrealist activity because some may strike up a better balance between instrumental reason and the imagination in flight than Western culture. Surrealism has had an identifiable impact on radical and revolutionary politics, both directly -- as in some surrealists joining or allying themselves with radical political groups, movements and parties -- and indirectly -- through the way in which surrealists' emphasis on the intimate link between freeing the imagination and the mind and liberation from repressive and archaic social structures. This was especially visible in the [[New Left]] of the 1960s and 1970s and the French revolt of May 1968, whose slogan "All power to the imagination" arose directly from French surrealist thought and practice.
Some [[artist]]s, such as [[H.R. Giger]] in [[Europe]], who won an [[Academy Awards|Academy Award]] for his stage set, and who also designed the "creature," in the movie ''[[Alien (movie)|Alien]],'' have been popularly called "Surrealists," though Giger is a [[Visionary art|visionary artist]] and he does not claim to be surrealist.
[[The Society for the Art of Imagination]] has come in for particularly bitter criticism from a self-labeled surrealist movement (although this criticism has been characterized by at least one anonymous individual as coming from "the Marxists [sic] Surrealist groups, who maintain small contingents worldwide;" he has also pointed out what he considers the hypocrisy of any Surrealist criticism of the Society for the Art of Imagination given that [[Kathleen Fox]] designed the cover of issue 4 of the bulletin of the [[Groupe de Paris du Mouvement Surrealiste]] and also participated in the [[2003]] Brave Destiny[http://wahcenter.net/exhibits/2003/surreal/index.html] show at the [[Williamsburg Art & Historical Center]]. Though some presented ''Brave Destiny'' as the largest-ever exhibit of Surrealist artists, the show was officially billed as exhibiting "Surrealism, Surreal/[[Conceptual art|Conceptual]], Visionary, [[Fantastic art|Fantastic]], [[Symbolism]], [[Magic Realism]], [[the Vienna School]], [[Neuve Invention]], [[Outsider art|Outsider]], [[Na?ve art|Na?ve]], [[the Macabre]], [[the Grotesque|Grotesque]] and [[Singulier Art]].)"
==Critiques of Surrealism==
Surrealism has been critiqued from several perspectives:
[[Freud]] initiated the psychoanalytic critique of surrealism with his remark that what interested him most about the surrealists was not their unconscious but their conscious. His meaning was that the manifestations of and experiments with psychic automatism highlighted by surrealists as the liberation of the unconscious were highly structured by ego activity, similar to the activities of the dream censorship in dreams, and that therefore it was in principle a mistake to regard surrealist poems and other art works as direct manifestations of the unconscious, when they were indeed highly shaped and processed by the ego. In this view, the surrealists may have been producing great works, but they were products of the conscious, not the unconscious mind, and they deceived themselves with regard to what they were doing with the unconscious. In psychoanalysis proper, the unconscious does not just express itself automatically but can only be uncovered through the analysis of resistance and transference in the psychoanalytic process.
[[Feminists]] have in the past critiqued the surrealist movement for being, despite the occasional few celebrated woman surrealist painters and poets, fundamentally a male movement and a male fellowship. They believe that it adopts typical male attitudes toward women, such as worshipping them symbolically in stereotypical romantic but sexist ways, as representing higher values and truths, putting them on a pedestal, making them into objects of desire and of mystery. This is carried out in a characteristically sexist manner, keeping women in a subordinate role in the surrealist movement and in the personal lives of the surrealists themselves.
[[Marxists]] have critiqued the surrealists for being revolutionaries merely in their own minds, whilst living the lives of self-indulgent bourgeois intellectuals, who were not serious collaborators of actual social and political revolutionary movements and actions, although a number of them did so collaborate as individuals.
==See also==
'''Techniques, games and humor'''
*[[Surrealist games]]
*[[Surreal humour]]
*[[Surrealist techniques]]
'''Related art movements and genres'''
*[[Cacophony Society]]
*[[Dada]]
*[[Fluxus]]
*[[Hysterical realism]] and [[Maximalism]]
*[[Post-Surrealism]]
*[[Situationism]]
==Sources==
'''[[André Breton]]'''
* André Breton, ''Manifestoes of Surrealism'' containing the 1<SUP>st</SUP>, 2<SUP>nd</SUP> and introduction to a possible 3<SUP>rd</SUP> Manifesto, and in addition the novel ''The Soluble Fish'' and political aspects of the Surrealist movement. ISBN 0472179004.
* ''What is Surrealism?: Selected Writings of André Breton''. ISBN 0873488229.
* André Breton, ''Conversations: The Autobiography of Surrealism'' (Gallimard [[1952]]) (Paragon House English rev. ed. [[1993]]). ISBN 1569249709.
* André Breton. ''The Abridged Dictionary of Surrealism'', reprinted in:
** Marguerite Bonnet, ed. ([[1988]]). ''Oeuvres complètes'', 1:328. Paris: Éditions Gallimard.
'''Other sources'''
* Guillaume Appollinaire ([[1917]], [[1991]]). Program note for ''Parade'', printed in ''Oeuvres en prose complètes'', 2:865-866, Pierre Caizergues and Michel Décaudin, eds. Paris: Éditions Gallimard.
* Gerard Durozoi, ''History of the Surrealist Movement'' (translated by Alison Anderson, University of Chicago Press). [[2004]]. ISBN 0226174115.
* [[Franklin Rosemont|Rosemont, Franklin]], ''Surrealism and Its Popular Accomplices'' San Francisco, CA: City Lights Books ([[1980]]). ISBN 087286121X.
* Brotchie, Alastair and Gooding, Mel, eds. ''A Book of Surrealist Games'' Berkeley, CA: Shambhala ([[1995]]). ISBN 1570620849.
* Moebius, Stephan. ''Die Zauberlehrlinge. Soziologiegeschichte des [[Collège de Sociologie]]. Konstanz: UVK [[2006]]. (About the [[College of Sociology]], its members and sociological impacts).
*Maurice Nadeau, History of Surrealism (Cambridge, Mass.: Belknap Press, 1989). ISBN 0674403452.
* Alexandrian, Sarane. ''Surrealist Art'' London: Thames & Hudson, [[1970]].
* Melly, George ''Paris and the Surrealists'' Thames & Hudson. [[1991]].
* Lewis, Helena ''The Politics Of Surrealism'' [[1988]]
* [[Mary Ann Caws|Caws, Mary Ann]] ''Surrealist Painters and Poets: An Anthology'' [[2001]] MIT Press
==External links==
Academic resources/'Classical' Surrealism:
*[http://www.tcf.ua.edu/Classes/Jbutler/T340/SurManifesto/ManifestoOfSurrealism.htm ''Manifesto of Surrealism'' by André Breton. 1924.]
*[http://www.site-magister.com/surrealis.htm Surrealism] (in French)
*[http://pers-www.wlv.ac.uk/~fa1871/whatsurr.html ''What is Surrealism?'' Lecture by Breton, Brussels 1934]
*[http://www.madsci.org/~lynn/juju/surr/surrealism.html The Surrealism Server]
*[http://pomaranczowa-alternatywa.republika.pl Happenings by the Orange Alternative]
*[http://www.serbiansurrealism.com/ The Surrealist Movement in Serbia] +
*[http://www.libcom.org/history/articles/surrealism-politics/index.php The radical politics of Surrealism, 1919-1950] - an article looking at Surrealism and Surrealists' connections to anarchist, socialist and working class politics
* [http://www.gerard-bertrand.net/index.htm Franz Kafka and Marcel Proust, the 2 Albums], "recomposed photographs", in a rather surrealist spirit.-->
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