A literary and art movement inspired by Freudianism, Andre Breton founded Surrealism in Paris in 1924. Breton authored the Manifesto (Manifeste du surrealisme), which advocated the expression of imagination revealed in dreams. He later wrote two other manifestoes, published in 1930 and 1934. Surrealism was the successor the Dadaist movement and attracted many Dadaist artists. Other Surrealist origins came from painters such as Paolo Uccello, William Blake, and Odilon Redon. Its origins in literature were traced to French poets Baudelaire, Rimbaud, and Apollinaire and the literary side of the movement remained primarily in France. In the visual realm, Surrealism became popular in the 1920’s and 30’s with the help of internationally renowned painter, Salvador Dali.

Also similar to the 19th century Symbolist movement, Surrealism was based on the psychoanalytic theories of Sigmund Freud and Carl Jung, emphasizing imagination and subconscious imagery. Work usually contained realist imagery arranged in a nonsensical style in order to create a dreamlike state. Surrealist painting incorporated a lot of content and technique. Surrealism incorporated and celebrated the art of children and primitive art. They appreciated the innocent eye in that the untrained artist was more liberated to depict their actual imaginative ideas

Artists used spontaneous techniques based on the “free association?concept, also called automatism, in which conscious control was surrendered to the unconscious mind. . The Surrealist movement can be divided into two groups of differing expressive methods, Automatism or “Absolute?Surrealism and Veristic Surrealism. While Automatism was focused on expressing subconscious ideas, Veristic Surrealists wanted to represent a connection between abstract and real material forms. In other words, Verists transformed objects from the real world in their paintings, while Automatists derived their imagery purely from spontaneous thought.

Surrealism paved the way for later movements such as Abstract Expressionism and the Magic Realism. Surrealism offered an alternative to geometric abstraction and kept expressive content alive in the 20th century.

Artists: (biography & artworks) Related Paintings Reproductions

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