Biblical and historical dreams have provided artists with exciting subjects to paint since at least the eleventh century but it was not until the surrealist movement came along that dreams were psychologically captured in essence and in feeling. Surrealism, the name given to an artistic group in France in 1924, endeavoured to express dreams, the action of the unconscious mind, on to canvas. Although nightmares were no stranger to the imagination of the artist, Goya in particular excelling in this respect, none had tried to convey the atmosphere and symbolic message of the dream-experience until this time. 'Surrealism is based on a belief in the omnipotence of the dream', said Andre Breton, often called the Pope of the Surrealist movement.
Reaching its heyday in the 1930's the influence responsible for its emergence was clearly that of psychoanalysis. With Freud's emphasis on free association of ideas, laced with sexual repression and Jung's symbolism; paintings appeared that shocked the world to its artistic roots. And even today there are those who, not caring to understand dreams, let alone art, dismiss this art as total rubbish.
Salvador Dali's paintings, with titles like ' The Persistence of Memory' 'The Birth of Liquid Desires' ' The Spectre of Sex Appeal' are clearly reflections of Freudian-type dreams. Melting telephones and furniture, watches, crutches, barren beaches. Eerily produce appropriate, dreamlike atmospheres of general un-ease and obsession. In contrast, Max Ernest, with his 'Robing of the Bride' and 'The Eye of Silver' fills his scenes with archetypal forests, blazing suns, bird-headed women, rocks towering to the sky, silent swamps and mysterious figures all very much in keeping with the traditional Jungian concept of dreams.
Other artists in this group went on to paint anxiety dreams, portraying strong feelings of fear and terror in one form or another. Hypnagogic dreams were a popular subject, too, showing images falling half-way between sleep and the waking state. Here to stay, surrealism certainly opened the door on our inner world and in so doing, contributed in its own way towards a better understanding of art, ourselves and, of course, dreams too, for dreams are very much like paintings.
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27 comments:
Hi Maria
In the Hitchcock film "Spellbound" there is a very nice dream sequence created by Salvador Dali.
In the film, heavily influenced by Freudianism, a man undergoes an experience which he afterwards blots out of his mind. But the exoerience reappears, disguised, in the form of a dream.
Here's a joke about Dali : an unkind critic once noted that his name is an anagram of "Avida Dollars."
PS I like the dog. I think I've seen that one before.
Thank you Robert.
Well done! that is one of the best examples in motion of what Surrealism is. You Tube has this film. See this link for Dali's pictures with a tribute song to Dali by Mecano. Awesome !
htt/www.YouTube.com/watch?v=OG9bzF}
htt/www.YouTube.com/watch?v=sM2Xw6
Nice song.
I wish I knew what she was singing about. Heh, heh.
Hi Robert
She was singing to Dali. It's a tribute song to him, extolling him as a genious. I think somewhere I have that song amongst my Spanish music CDs. You have seen that dog because I sent you a copy of it a long time ago. His name is Skippy. His owner wanted his portrait done after he saw the other dog -below- at a friend's house. Dogs are really appreciated in Wales and am playing with the idea of turning those two dogs into cards, since dog cards are more popular where I live and sell well too. Currently, I'm painting a black dog.
Maria, good luck with the cards but don't put a surrealist dog on them if you want them to sell!
There was a famous surrealist film - I don't know the director - which never seems to be shown on TV except that there is one famous, and rather disturbing, clip from it which has been shown and has stayed in my memory. A man is about to cut a woman's eye, and at that moment we see a plane flying across the sky in front of the moon.
One finds surrealism in unexpected places. I was reading a book of journalistic impressions of London, from years ago, and the writer jokingly tells how the MPs at the House of Commons had a debate and decided that henceforth the angles of a triabgle should add up to 180 degrees and that a square should, by law, have all four sides equal.
There's a film I think I told you about before, where a man goes into a phone box to make a call, and then finds he can't get out. No one comes to his assistance, and at the end of the day a truck takes away the box and puts it in a cave full of other phone boxes with people inside them. The key thing is, no explanation was offered at all. That would only have spoilt it.
Hi Robert
I know the Surrealist film you are referring to. It is called: 'Le Chien Andalou' the film director was Luis Bunuel. Dali also had that nasty sensation or rather fear, of losing his eye-sight and in a picture he portrayed a fried egg where a sharp blande is perilously swinging above, from a dead branch. The fried egg looked very much like Dali's eye.
You can see 'Le Chien Andalou' film for free, in YouTube its on the same link I posted earlier.
Thanks Maria. What a weird film!
Hi Robert,
The sequence you are describing has to do with bureaucracy ! and how ridiculous it can be, devoid of all common sense. There is another scene where a little boy has gone missing but even though the boy has already been returned to his home, the policeman who reported his disapearence continues his report of the missing child although the child is tugging his coat ! You know... is bureacracy gone mad. Although I have known of real life cases where it beats that in stupidity. when a certain council was trying to charge a dead man the sum of O.OO pounds and if he didn't setlle his debt right away...they were going to fine him ! Where? to his grave? for owing what? O.OO ? it defies all common sense !
Maria, re bureaucracy, did you mean the triangles and squares?
That business with the bill for £0.00 is probably down to some stupid computer. Computers are stupid. The light is on but nobody's at home. However, even when this sort of error is pointed out to a human, nothing is done. Which I suppose makes the humans as stupid as the computers.
Hi Robert,
Can you imagine that big businesses are hoping to replace humans with computers ? It has already happened in airplanes, the so called "Drones" in Afghanistan have killed more innocent civilians than anything else.
I reckon that the humans are as stupid as the computers. Listen to this other story about a little old lady who had for 30 years parked at the same spot in a car- park to go to her hair dresser. When she came back, the council had decided that the very spot where she had always parked would from now on, be illegal. So when she came back she found, the double canary yellow lines painted around her car, and like if that wasn't enough... they also slap her with a hefty fine in her windscreen ! She was naturally furious because apart from all that, the sloppy workers had also splashed her white car with canary yellow paint all over. She could not even see properly through her windscreen. When the story appeared in one of the newspapers, the council concerned cancel the fine, re-sprayed her car and sent her a bouquet of flowers, but that was only after the council were embarrased in one of the national tabloids. The council hurriedly tried to make up for the greedy stupid blunder and insensitivity.
Hi Maria
Local councils are exactly the same as national governments, i.e. not worth voting for. They do all they can to squeeze as much as they can from as many as they can. After all, the mayors must have their new limousines.
Hello Maria and Robert,
it's good to see you back Maria, I love both of your dog pictures, they are beautiful creatures with unconditional love.
I hope you post the painting of the black dog that you are currently working on, for us to see when you finish it.
Those Dali links look interesting, I will watch them when I have a bit of free time.
We had a Dali exhibition here in Melbourne not long ago, unfortunately I missed it ..would have liked to have seen it.
Hi Victoria, Robert
That is very kind of you to say.
Okay. I can post the picture of the dog I'm currently working on, and when I finish it, I will put on the finished work. Actually, I have now drawn it twice, because I did not like the first treatment, so I started all over again, but am using the previous sketch for the final version.
It is a real shame that you missed that Dali exhibition. I think the Spanish put it up when the King and Queen of Spain visited Sydney not long ago this year. Dali is a very interesting painter; thanks to his paintings he made us aware of the power of dreams since dreams provide the inspirational visions as we are for the most part, unaware of the unique role dreams play in helping us solve problems. Whether we are aware or not, we all have the ability to solve our problems in two different ways, on two distinctly different levels of understanding. When we are awake, we use our intellect and reasoning powers but when we are asleep our inspiration and symbolic vision takes over. Figuratively, these contributions are from our head and from our hearts. The power of dreams which provides the inspirational visions works spontaneously so we are, for the most part, unaware of the unique role it has played in helping us. 'Sleep on it' we are adviced when faced with difficult decisions and apparently insoluble situations and most of us have experienced the benefit from doing this. Often we have gone to sleep with fears rampaging through our heads yet on waking in the morning find to our intense relief that the cloud has lifted and hope has returned. And this improvement in our affairs is thanks to our dreaming minds, we usually take for granted.
Hi Victoria
Good to see you again.
Yes, let's see the dog, Maria.
Speaking of dogs, did anyone notice that in the Andalusian Dog the man who comes in and chucks the other guy's stuff out of the window always has his back to camera? We never see his face. If memory serves, the "owner of the establishment" in the Hitchcock film was masked. Did Dali have a thing about unseen faces?
No he did not. Dali painted many works using the device of Double Imagery, which consists of an intriguing use of an image that can be seen either as a face with large eyes or a man on a plunging horse, and running and struggling figures on the painting in his picture: 'Spanish Civil War' it shows the technique at its most successful, or fighting warriors (which ever way you want to see it) as both images are within the same painting.
Robert, the painting is called: SPAIN and the woman which is suggested in the painting, symbolises The Spanish Civil War.
maria, I think I know that one - a rather disturbing scene of a woman being torn literally in half.
Mmmm... I know which one you are thinking of, but it is not that one. So I will put it up here, so that you can see the one I mean with the Double Imagery effect. You will like it. I trust...
Hi Robert, You will be able to see the double imagery effect if you look very close-up the image you will see men riding horses whilst they fight. One of them has a red banner but on the other hand, if you half-close your eyes for a moment, suddenly the red banner become the red lips of a woman !
On the full size picture, here Dali paints the woman's head and upper part of her body in such a way that they can be read as warriors locked in a battle. These are based on Leonardo's drawings of fighting horsemen.
Thanks Maria. I think I see what you mean. Yes, that's very clever.
HAPPY ANNIVERSARY !!!
Today 13th of October exactly is our one year anniversary of "ALL SUBJECTS UNDER THE SUN " thank you my dear friends who have stuck with me, during good and bad moments all this time. I feel like celebrating ! A day free of tyranny! where I don't have to hear fights and insults, a place where we can relax and learn more about life, art or whatever takes our fancy and be with dear friends. It doesn't matter if the world is burning in hell or the economy is at last showing signs of recovery from the battering of foreign wars. Here, we can talk about ART and the creativity of men with vision and their wonderful works which have outlasted their mortal coil. These artists will always be remembered even by men and women who have not been born yet, these great works of Art are here to stay, whilst the warriors wither from the moment they enter into their fruitless sad and pathetic wars.
A Happy Birthday to the Blog!
Maria, the great works of art are not only not withering, but may actually be increasing - they think they may have found a painting by Leonardo which has been hitherto misattributed.
Oh really ? That sounds exciting!
I should open another thread about Leonardo da Vinci.
Yes .. 'HAPPY FIRST YEAR ANNIVERSARY' of your blog Maria!
Well it is the morning of the 14th here, but I think still the 13th in the UK.
I haven't contributed as much as I would always like, but life with it's duties seems always to be calling.
So much of the art posts that you have written Maria .. have been very inspiring, to understand art on a different level, and to see it from the 'artists' perspective.
Oh Hi Victoria, Happy Anniversary !
Thank you for your sweet words and you are right, it is still the 13th here in the U.K. whilst in Australia is the 14th!! Quite amazing that we can talk from a day behind you ! Its like talking through travelling time, words are travelling through space and time.
I understand. Family commitments can be time consuming and you are a day ahead of our time. Awesome !
As you can see... I have opened another thread that is still on the 13th so I suppose, now that should be a very lucky number for us. Viva the blog !
Maybe It might seem as though im trying to put a "spanner in the works" ..but im not really,just that im not really that convinced about the worth of so called surrealism or abstract art....can it all be classed under the all encompassing banner of "modern art".
Is there ever a genuine message in any of it?Or is it just plain confusion?...or worse? is it a con trick? Is it perhaps designed so that some can claim that they belong to an exclusive club?The membership fee to that club of course is to be able to "see" and "understand" that which is not there?
Warhol was a classic example soup cans piled in a heap masquerading as art...art with a profound message,if one only had the eyes to see..
"ARTISTS" riding bikes on canvas ,ploughing through globs of different coloured paint,spewing that paint hither and thither in some random pattern,then claiming that the resultant mess was the artists rendition of "hannibal crossing the alps"..a personal rendition of course,to which the sequined and top hatted crowd (if the artist was famous enough)would nod their heads in unison,at some pre-arranged signal and bow to the majesty placed before them as though it was a gift from the gods.....while "yosser Hughes" might look at his unemployed and pathetic status and mournfully wail "givus a bike and some paint-I can do that!" He no doubt could,but "yosser hughes" versus Dali is no real contest .....
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