Surrealism Art - Essay Example

Surrealism is both a style of art and a cultural movement that was started by Andre Breton in the year 1924. Surrealism style of art makes use of visual imagery that originates in the subconscious mind which results in the creation of artwork that lacks the intended logical comprehensibility which is a fundamental feature of traditional artwork. Surrealism began as a movement in Europe in general and Paris in particular. A lot of members of the Dada community were attracted to surrealism. The surrealist movement is similar to the symbolist movement of the late 1800s in that both were inspired by Freud and Jung’s psychoanalytical work. Artists of the 20th century that actively participated in the surrealist movement included but were not limited to Rene Magritte, Man Ray, and Giorgio de Chirico.

Surrealist artists invented techniques that tended to portray the mechanisms of dreams, thus emphasizing upon the theory of liberation through their artwork. Giorgio de Chirico is known as the pioneer of surrealist aesthetics. Surrealist artists gained inspiration from his work and attempted to minimize the role of will and consciousness in the artwork. Potential examples of this include Andre Masson’s automatic drawings, Max Ernst’s use of collage and frottage techniques, and radiographs made by Man Ray. Thereafter, oneiric images were made by Dali and Magritte by juxtaposing contrasting elements.

The first group of surrealist artists exhibited their artwork in 1925 in Paris. The exhibitions that were subsequently arranged in London and New York in the year 1936 led to the spread and recognition of the surrealist style of art on a larger scale. An exhibition was arranged in 1937 in Tokyo followed by another in Paris in 1938. The surrealist style of art has influenced American art a lot. For instance, “the practice of automatism is one basis for Jackson Pollock's work and for Action Painting, while the Surrealists' interest in objects prefigures Pop Art” (Heron, 2007).

Surrealist paintings portray dreams. These paintings contain familiar objects that are painted in such a way as to make them appear strange and unknown. This motivates the audiences to look at things of everyday use from a different perspective and thus change their feelings and perceptions about them. Surrealist paintings have the power to stir up strange feelings toward known objects in the audiences’ minds. Surrealism provided the artists with a way to juxtapose both unconscious and conscious realms of experience in such a comprehensive manner that blur the interface between the world of fantasy and the world of reality.

Surrealism also has political significance. The French Communist Party and the Paris surrealist group joined to oppose French colonialism in Morocco in the year 1925. The Paris Surrealist group wrote in a letter to Paul Claudel, “[W]e surrealists pronounced ourselves in favor of changing the imperialist war, in its chronic and colonial form, into a civil war. Thus we placed our energies at the disposal of the revolution, of the proletariat and its struggles, and defined our attitude towards the colonial problem, and hence towards the color question" (“Surrealism in the United States”).