Comparison of Desk Suit with Chest of Drawers in Relation to Surrealism - Essay Example

Comparison of Desk suit (1936) with Chest of drawers (1936) in relation to surrealism Introduction Surrealism was a cultural and literary movement that promoted the automatic and creative thinking among members of a society. In arts, surrealism promoted the notions of free and imaginative mind. This enhanced the portrayal of the unconscious since surrealism rejected the notions of logic and reasoning (Mundy 71). In literal terms, surrealism translates to “beyond and reality”. In this paper, I compare two surrealist paintings; Desk suit by Elisa Schiaparelli and Chest of drawers by Salvador Dali. The two painters were among the major proponents of the cultural and artistic movement. Their two paintings are therefore fundamental in fostering the growth of the ideologies at the time. I will divide in two sections; the first section will discuss Salvador Dali’s painting and the second will discuss Elisa Schiaparelli’s painting. I will use fifteen sources key among which are Surrealism: Crossings/frontiers, a book by Adamowicz, Elza and Realism, Rationalism, Surrealism: Art between the Wars by Fer, Briony, David Batchelor, and Paul Wood among many other books and journals. Section 1: Chest of drawers by Salvador Dali The painting is an artistic masterpiece that embodies the dictates of surrealism. The painting of a human with his bodies partitioned by drawers is a representation of Sigmund Freud’s psychoanalysis. Art is a cultural product that often criticizes and represents the society. Sigmund Freud developed unique ideas of psychology that remains essential to the study to date. As such, Dali borrowed his ideas at the time to visualize the dictates of his ideologies. The artistic painting is an imaginative representation of Freud’s unique psychology that assets that the human body consists of platonic. The separate drawers represent the various secrets that a human keeps all of which are accessible only through an effective psychoanalysis as proposed by Sigmund Freud (Descharnes Michael, Gilles and Salvador 55). The painting is unique as it communicates to a specific audience, one that understands psychoanalysis and can therefore extrapolate the development of the world. The painting is of a weak human body sprawling on the floor. The body extends an equally frail arm as though rejecting the external world. The chest is a series of drawers half open with the body bowing her head to look into the drawers. Above and around the body is darkness. Dali portrays the body as a woman by strategically including two knobs to represent the nipples of a woman’s breasts. The panting therefore analyses human psychology in relation to women. The artist analyses the secretive structure of a woman’s minds coupled with the society’s rejection of the external world at the time. Chest of drawers by Salvador Dali is a small oil on wood painting. The painting has a large frame and portrays the painting and artistic genius in Deli. The message and theme in the painting is complex. The painting shows a woman opening up her drawers, which represents the secrets in her life while on the other hand she stretches her frail hand. In doing this, the woman expresses her rejection and resistance of the external world, which should not access her secrets. Surrealists propagated the expression of desires, inner thoughts and dreams among others. This justifies Dali’s unique fictional painting. While the painting does not represent any existing structure, it portrays Dali’s conceptualization of Freud’s idea of psychoanalysis, which remains a significant invention in the practice to date. Dali portrays the platonic structure of human mind thus enhancing the understanding of the theory. However, unlike many other surrealist painters at the time Dali adopted a realist juxtaposition of surrealism. This implies that he used familiar and everyday objects in his paintings to enhance the understanding of his arguments. The same applies to the Chest of drawers. In the painting, Dali presents a woman with her chest consisting of a series of drawers. Both the drawers and the piece of cloth among other objects in the painting are familiar and everyday objects that everyone readily identifies. In such a realist juxtaposition, he infuses the intricate dictates of surrealism by creating a weird and dreamlike object. The painting manifests Freudian ideologies of internalization and reclusion. The drawers in the woman’s chest open spontaneously thus threatening to reveal her secrets. She therefore reacts by pushing away the rest of the external world as she strives to conceal her secrets. The anthropomorphic drawers in the painting represent Freudian psychoanalysis. Section 2: Desk suit by Elisa Schiaparelli Crowned the queen of surrealism, Elisa Schiaparelli observed the dictates of surrealism as she fostered the development of artistic paintings representing equally weird and dreamlike subject matter as vouched by surrealists. In her desk of suits, she represents the contemporary independent woman who wears suits to work every morning (Brandon 44). The suit has a series of both real and false. The drawers look like the actual drawers of a desk a feature that makes the painting similar to Dali’s Chest of drawers “The oil on canvas painting is symbolic of the fashion trend that Schiaparelli pioneered at the time” (Krauss and Jane 121). The suit has a seamless flow with the colors of the fabric resembling that of the drawers. This makes it difficult for an audience to notice the drawers. However, she places shiny buttons that make the drawers visible and similar to those in an actual drawer. Schiaparelli studies such themes as discord, dystopia and discontentment in weird and satirical ways. Desk suits is such a painting in which she likens humans to furniture. The dress offers people an efficient way of carrying their offices with them. Surrealists including Dali often compared humans to inanimate objects key among which was furniture. Dali does the same in her most famous painting Chest of Drawers. Schiaparelli borrowed the idea from Dali thus developing a human figure with a set of drawers in her suit. The drawers help organize the life of an employed individual. She therefore captures this in a satirical form as people glorified work. The love for work thus enhanced his creation of a unique suit with a series of drawers. Each of the drawers carries specific items. Such is a feature of orderliness that Freud explains was psychological. The organization of people at their places of work through the drawers represented the organization of their thoughts in their heads. Freud explained that a female mind has a platonic structure. The spread of the theory of psychoanalysis at the time influenced the two surrealist works. Both Dali and Schiaparelli strive to capture the platonic structure of the human mind. Ironically, both artists paint female figures in their works a feature that validates the claim that a woman’s mind exists in small drawer lie structures with each concealing ordered secrets. Revealing such secrets is always difficult and a woman would always defend her secrets and walk with them. Schiaparelli’s suit offers women an opportunity to walk with their drawers and so is Dali’s painting, which implants the drawers on the chest of the woman. Summary Elisa Schiaparelli and Salvador Dali are two iconic artists who enhanced the development of surrealism type of art. Both artists painted their works in appropriate media thus enhancing the development of both the art and the cultural movement. Additionally, the two painters developed their artifacts in the same year besides addressing the same thematic issue. This portrays the attempt by the two to capture and represent the prevailing social and economic features in the society. They uphold the dictates of surrealism by moving “beyond and above reality” to capture a satirical form of fundamental factors affecting the people in the society at the time. This way, the two do not only embody the representative function of art but also foster the growth of knowledge since they fostered the ideals of surrealism, which grew to become a substantial movement in arts. Conclusion In retrospect, Chest of Drawers and Desk suits are two distinct artifacts developed by two separate artists who ascribed to the same ideologies prevalent at the time. Key among the connection between the two paintings is their representation of the platonic structure of the human mind. As explained earlier, Sigmund Freud’s ideology was a phenomenal explanations that revamped psychoanalysis. As such, the two artists strive to represent the ideal in their own artistic ways using the tools at their disposal. They for example use oil paint on canvas and on wood respectively. Salvador Dali’s painting and ideas were unique. He did not only embody Freudian principles of psychoanalysis but also portrayed his artistic genius as he sought to represent the same “beyond and above reality”. Just as any other surrealist at the time, he compares the human features to furniture by creating the numerous drawers on the chest of the furniture (Adamowicz 45). The painting enjoys details that enhance its effectiveness to communicate the thoughts and ideas of the painter, Elisa Schiaparelli Dali’s ideas in her own work as she uses the same notion of drawers to design her unique suit. Works cited Adamowicz, Elza. Surrealism: Crossings/frontiers. Oxford: Lang, 2006. Print. Ades, Dawn. Dada and Surrealism Reviewed. London: Arts Council of Great Britain, 1978. Alexandrian, Sarane. Surrealist Art. New York: Thames & Hudson, 1985. Aubert, Nathalie, and Pierre-Philippe Fraiture. From Art Nouveau to Surrealism: Belgian Modernity in the Making. London: Legenda, 2007. Print. Balakian, Anna. Surrealism: The Road to the Absolute ; with a New Introd. Chicago [u.a.: Univ. of Chicago Pr, 1986. Print. Brandon, Ruth. Surreal Lives: The Surrealists, 1917–1945. London: Macmillan, 1999. Print. Breton, André. Manifestoes of Surrealism. Translated by Richard Seaver and Helen R. Lane. Ann Arbor: University of Michigan Press, 1969. Print. Descharnes, Robert, Michael Hulse, Gilles Néret, and Salvador Dalí. Salvador Dali, 1904-1989: The Paintings, Volume Ii, 1946-1989. Hong Kong: Tashen, 2007. Print. Fer, Briony, David Batchelor, and Paul Wood. Realism, Rationalism, Surrealism: Art between the Wars. New Haven: Yale University Press, in association with the Open University, 1994. Print. Klingsöhr-Leroy, Cathrin. Surrealism. Köln: Taschen, 2006. Print. Krauss, Rosalind E., and Jane Livingston. LAmour Fou: Photography & Surrealism. Exhibition catalogue. New York: Abbeville, 1985. Print. Mundy, Jennifer, ed. Surrealism: Desire Unbound. Exhibition catalogue. London: Tate Publishing, 2001. Print. Rubin, William S. Dada and Surrealist Art. New York: Abrams, 1968. Print. Schiaparelli, Elsa. Shocking Life: The Autobiography of Elsa Schiaparelli. London: V & A, 2007. Print. Walz, Robin. Pulp Surrealism: Insolent Popular Culture in Early Twentieth-Century Paris. Berkeley: University of California Press, 2000. Internet resource. Read More